Selena Wisnom’s research centres on the heritage of ancient Iraq, specifically the languages, literature, and intellectual history of Mesopotamia. Areas of interest include Babylonian poetics and metre, Mesopotamian scholarly texts, divination, and neo-Assyrian history. She also works with several arts, heritage, and community organisations to promote wider engagement with Iraq’s ancient history and culture, especially through theatre and performance.
She initially studied Classics before taking up graduate work in Cuneiform Studies. My MPhil and DPhil focused on Babylonian poetry, and alongside my research I wrote a trilogy of plays set in ancient Assyria. Subsequently I held an AHRC Cultural Engagement Fellowship, working to build links between theatres and academic research. In Oct 2016 I was elected to a Junior Research Fellowship in Manuscripts and Text Cultures at The Queen’s College, Oxford, and I was a fixed-term lecturer in Assyriology at the University of Cambridge from 2017-2019. I joined the University of Leicester in 2020 as the first Lecturer in the Heritage of the Middle East.
Books in order of publication:
Weapons of Words – Intertextual Competition in Babylonian Poetry – 2019
Enuma Elish: the Babylonian Epic of Creation – 2024
The Library of Ancient Wisdom: Mesopotamia and the Making of History – 2025
Oak Lawn Library Friends 