Rate My Professor Michael Anderson

Michael Anderson is Professor and Chair of the Department of Classics at San Francisco State University, specializing in Classical Archaeology. He also serves as Interim Director and Graduate Coordinator of the Museum Studies Program. Anderson earned his B.A. in History from the University of California, Los Angeles in 1997, followed by an M.A. in Archaeology from UCLA in 2001. He completed his Ph.D. in Archaeology at the University of Cambridge in 2005, with a dissertation entitled 'Visitors, Inhabitants, Space and Power in the Roman House.' He joined San Francisco State University as tenure-track faculty in 2006.

Anderson's research centers on Roman urbanism, domestic architecture, and spatial analysis, with a focus on Pompeii where he has conducted fieldwork since 1996. As Director of the Via Consolare Project since 2006, he investigates urban development along Pompeii's Via Consolare, employing digital tools such as Geographical Information Systems (GIS), Structure from Motion, and computer applications in archaeology. He served as the final Field Director of the Anglo-American Project in Pompeii and is completing the publication of excavations at the Casa del Chirurgo (House of the Surgeon, VI.1.9-10.23), originally conducted by the University of Bradford from 2002 to 2006. His additional research interests include Egyptian epigraphy. Key publications include the book House of the Surgeon, Pompeii: Excavations in the Casa del Chirurgo (VI.1, 9-10.23) (2017), Space, Movement, and Visibility in Pompeian Houses (2016), 'Public Buildings and Private Opportunities: Some Dynamics in Pompeii’s Urban Development' (2015, Journal of Roman Archaeology), 'Structure from Motion and Archaeological Excavation: Experiences of the Via Consolare Project in Pompeii' (2021), and chapters such as 'Pompeii’s Insula VI 1 and the Casa del Chirurgo' (2017) and 'Disruption or Continuity? The Spatio-Visual Evidence of Post-Earthquake Pompeii' (2011). Anderson's contributions have advanced methodological innovations in classical archaeology through digital reconstruction and stratigraphic analysis.