Jodi Magness

Who is Jodi Magness?

Jodi Magness is the Kenan Distinguished Professor for Teaching Excellence in Early Judaism at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She previously taught at Tufts University. She received her B.A. in Archaeology and History from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and her Ph.D. in Classical Archaeology from the University of Pennsylvania. From 1990-92, Professor Magness was Mellon Post-Doctoral Fellow in Syro-Palestinian Archaeology at the Center for Old World Archaeology and Art at Brown University.

Magness has participated in 20 different excavations in Israel and Greece. She co-directed the 1995 excavations of the Roman siege works at Masada. From 1997-99 she co-directed excavations at Khirbet Yattir in Israel. Since 2003 Professor Magness has been the co-director of the excavations in the late Roman fort at Yotvata, Israel. In 2011 she began to dig at Huqoq.

Magness is an extremely popular professor whose "unique teaching style of using vivid anecdotes [keeps] students on the edge of their seats."