Ralph Hexter

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Ralph J. Hexter is the current president of Hampshire College, a progressive alternative college in Amherst, Massachusetts. Prior to assuming the post, Hexter was Executive Dean of Letters and Science and Dean of Arts and Humanities and at University of California, Berkeley. Hampshire is part of the five college consortium, which includes Mount Holyoke College, Amherst College, Smith College, and the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

Hexter was a 1974 magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College and a member of Phi Beta Kappa. After studying in England at Oxford's Corpus Christi College, he entered graduate school at Yale University. He received his Masters of Philosophy in 1979 and his Ph.D. in 1982 both from Yale and taught there in Classics and Humanities for ten years.

Hexter assumed the Hampshire College presidency on August 1, 2005. As is required of a president by Hampshire's constitution, Hexter is technically a full-time professor with given specialities in Classics and Literature. He is one of the few openly gay college presidents in America.

On September 18, 2007, a "Critical Announcement" was released to the Hampshire College students by President Hexter. In it, he states:

As most of you know, many years ago Manfred and I made a lifelong commitment to one another. Today we are excited to share with you the news that we were married over the Labor Day weekend.

When we arrived at Hampshire College in August 2005, we were deeply touched by the warm reception we received from the community and continue to feel honored to be a part of a group that embraces and celebrates diversity. We appreciate that living in Massachusetts has afforded us the same rights as any other couple. By choosing to be legally married we want to send a strong message that we believe discrimination should end everywhere and that all couples who wish to marry should have the right to do so.

The message went on to invite the students to celebrate the happy occasion with President Hexter and Manfred Kollmeier in an on-campus reception.

[edit] Bibliography

The Faith of Achates: Finding Aeneas' Other, by Ralph J. Hexter, Berkeley, CA: Doe Library, University of California, 1997.
A Guide to the Odyssey: A Commentary on the English Translation of Robert Fitzgerald, by Ralph J. Hexter, New York: Vintage Books, 1993.
Innovations of Antiquity, edited by Ralph Hexter and Daniel Selden, New York: Routledge, 1992.
Ovid and Medieval Schooling: Studies in Medieval School Commentaries on Ovid's Ars Amatoria, Epistulae ex Ponto, and Epistulae Heroidum, by Ralph J. Hexter, Munich: Arbeo-Gesellschaft, 1986.
Equivocal Oaths and Ordeals in Medieval Literature, by Ralph J. Hexter, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1975.