Background
Mrs. Porter was born in Clearfield, Pennsylvania, United States, on April 1, 1946. She is a daughter of James K. (a lawyer) and Frances (a homemaker; maiden name, Wilson) Nevling.
Mrs. Porter was born in Clearfield, Pennsylvania, United States, on April 1, 1946. She is a daughter of James K. (a lawyer) and Frances (a homemaker; maiden name, Wilson) Nevling.
Barbara Porter was a graduate of Swarthmore College, from which she received her Bachelor of Arts in 1968. In 1987 she finished her studies at University of Pennsylvania and earned Doctor of Philosophy.
Mrs. Porter was a secretary, treasurer, and sales representative at Chebeague Marine Enterprises, Inc., starting from 1977. Then she became a founder of Chebeague Island Parents’ Association in 1978 and its president from 1978 to 1985.
Barbara Porter was appointed consultant to Museum of Art at Bowdoin College, Brunswick, ME, during 1986-1990, lecturer in history since 1990. From 1990 till 1991 Barbara Porter joined the staff of Bates College, Lewiston, ME, working as a lecturer in philosophy and religion. She became a lecturer in Akkadian at Brandeis University, Waltham, MA, in 1993. She served as a visiting scholar during 1995-1996 at the same university. Concurrently she acted as a visiting scholar at Harvard University.
Mrs. Porter was a contributor to books, including Religious Transformations and Socio-Political Change: Eastern Europe and Latin America, Language and Culture in the Near East: Diglossia, Bilingualism, Registers; contributor of articles and reviews to scholarly journals, including Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society and Journal of Near Eastern Studies.
Mrs. Porter was a democrat and unabashed liberal.
Quotations: "To be honest, I teach and write about ancient Mesopotamia simply for the joy of it, but surreptitiously I cherish the hope that my work may somehow do somebody some good, if only by letting someone share my pleasure in puzzling out the workings of a world far removed in time from our own. I suspect that part of the value of Mesopotamian studies for our own time lies in this sense of distance from the ancient Mesopotamians that most of us feel. Trying to define what is so different about the Mesopotamians requires us to describe what we ourselves are like, how we operate, often with the surprising result that we find ourselves to be fundamentally much more like them than we had initially supposed. In trying to bridge the gap—to imagine the Mesopotamians sympathetically and accurately — we sometimes come to understand ourselves with unexpected clarity. So it is not quite the odd business that it appears to be, after all."
Barbara Porter married Michael H. Porter, a boatbuilder and designer, in 1970. They have three children: Stephen, Anne, Seth.