M. D. Usher (Mark) is a UVM alumnus and joined the UVM faculty in 2000. Before attending UVM as an undergraduate, he apprenticed in Germany as a post-and-beam carpenter. Upon graduation from UVM, he earned a PhD in Classics at The University of Chicago. To read a profile of Usher and his work in Tableau, the magazine of The University of Chicago’s Division of Humanities, click here. For a recent interview (in French) for the online magazine La pensée écologique, click here.

Usher teaches courses in environmental humanities and in ancient Mediterranean studies. His research and writing have taken him around the world. He has given lectures about classical antiquity not only in Europe and North America, but in Mongolia, Egypt, Singapore, India, and China.

His books include Plato’s Pigs and Other Ruminations (Cambridge, 2020), How to Be a Farmer (Princeton, 2021), How to Say No (Princeton, 2022), and How to Care about Animals (Princeton, 2023). In press at Princeton, to be published simultaneous in French by Presses universitaires de France, is Following Nature’s Lead: Ancient Ways of Living in a Dying World.

Outside of Academe, Usher and his wife built, own, and operate Works & Days Farm in Shoreham, where they produce lamb, eggs, beef, and maple syrup. Since 2018 he has helped organize research at The Roman Villa Project, an ancient olive grove and archaeological site in Mompeo, Italy that combines food systems, sustainable agriculture, and paleobotany. He is a Companion of The Guild of St. George, a charity for arts, crafts, and rural economy founded by John Ruskin in 1871.