Some people say you shouldn’t work with your spouse. Millsaps College professors Dr. Jenni Lewton-Yates and Dr. David Yates do a good job of proving that theory wrong.
Lewton-Yates grew up in northeast Ohio and took Latin as a foreign language in high school. She attended Ohio Wesleyan University with plans to study zoology, but the further she went in her academic studies, the more she realized she enjoyed her humanities classes more than her science lab courses.
Teaching in higher education wasn’t always a part of Lewton-Yates’ path. She grew up with a family of teachers, and she always thought she would teach at the grade level. And if it wasn’t for a Greek course, she might have followed in her family’s footsteps of teaching Latin at a high school.
“I was one class and a semester of student teaching away from obtaining an Ohio teaching license,” Lewton-Yates said.
“What changed my trajectory was when I started taking Greek instead of just Latin to finish off my classics major. I really liked studying Greek. I liked looking at it and enjoyed the literature I was getting to read. There were some high schools that taught Greek, but not many. That was the moment where my trajectory sort of veered, and I knew if I wanted to continue teaching Greek, it was going to have to be at the advanced level.”
Yates, associate professor of Greek and Roman studies, is from southwestern Virginia and found the classics through a love of history while helping his older brothers study for history tests.
“My mom used to send my brother in to tell me a bedtime story, which was just basically him trying to remember his history notes,” Yates said.
He earned a bachelor’s degree in the classics at the University of Virginia and then moved to Colorado to pursue a master of arts degree. As he continued his studies, he realized he wanted to go as far as the field would allow.
Their paths crossed at Brown University while pursuing their doctorates in the classics, and the rest was history.
Shortly after finishing his degree, Yates began receiving offers to teach at the college level. Three offers stood out: Walla Walla University in Washington, Southern Illinois University, and Millsaps College. Between the three, Millsaps had the position he wanted.
There was a caveat, though. Lewton-Yates was still in the middle of her Ph.D. program and teaching at a middle school.
“I knew when we got married that we were going to be a two-career family, and I said early on that I was not going to let academic appointments stop me from living in the same place as my spouse,” she said.
Fortunately, Lewton-Yates found a position as an adjunct professor at Millsaps while completing her degree. One adjunct class turned into two, and after she finished her degree, she took on her current role as assistant professor of Greek and Roman studies. Later, she added assistant dean for student success to her list of roles in the Millsaps community.
The couple has enjoyed various aspects of their time at Millsaps, from the courses they teach to the unique environment Millsaps fosters in the Jackson area.
Yates counts introductory courses among his favorites. In these courses, Yates teaches students from first-years to seniors, with students getting to participate in plays and skits in class. This semester, he’s teaching a course on ancient and medieval Europe in which he dons a toga and gives a declamation to students in Latin.
“We’re performing Cicero, so we’re talking about a lot of Roman rhetoric,” he said.
“I’ll be using all the proper hand gestures that our ancient authors tell that if you’re a practicing ward, these are the hand gestures to use. We take them outside to show how a Roman court case was viewed and tried. The idea is to get the students physically involved and connected to the text.”
Lewton-Yates’ favorite course is the third semester of Greek and Roman Languages. The class is the culmination of two prior courses, and students get to choose which Latin or Greek text to study. Often, it’s the New Testament from the Bible.
“They’ve slogged through the basics like vocabulary and grammar, and this course brings them face to face with the thing that was the whole point—the original Latin or Greek text for the first time,” she said.
“It’s fascinating to watch students read things they usually have memorized in English in the original Greek. They realize it doesn’t say what they always thought it said. You can see a lightbulb moment when students realize they can access more knowledge because of their work up to that point.”
When they’re not on campus, the couple is busy working on their home, watching “Star Wars” with their daughter, and enjoying everything the city of Jackson has to offer.
“We live in Belhaven, and it feels like a small town where I know my neighbors,” Yates said.
“The Jackson metro is a wonderful place with lots of things to do, and the city of Jackson is a really nice place to be.”