What happens when the ancient world becomes a place to discover not only the past, but something about yourself? In this episode of The Case for Classics, I sit down with Johns Hopkins Professor Nandini Pandey for a deeply personal conversation about Classics, identity, belonging, and who gets to claim the ancient world as their own.

Professor Pandey shares her journey as a South Asian American who discovered Latin in college and found in ancient literature a connection to a deeper past. We discuss the mentors who shaped her path, making Classics more accessible and inclusive, and how studying antiquity can challenge modern assumptions about race, power, and cultural identity.

We also explore founding myths and Professor Pandey’s powerful reading of Virgil’s Aeneid, in which Aeneas’s journey as a refugee and immigrant takes on new meaning—and reminds us why the ancient world can speak to all of us.