Rate My Professor Julia Troche

Dr. Julia D. Troche is an Egyptologist and Associate Professor of History at Missouri State University, where she joined the faculty in 2017. She earned her PhD in Egyptology and Assyriology from Brown University in 2015 and her BA in History from the University of California, Los Angeles in 2008. Her research specializations encompass the social history, religion, archaeology, language, and reception of ancient Egypt and the ancient Mediterranean. Troche serves in key advisory roles including Faculty Co-Advisor for the History Club and Ancient Worlds Club, Safe-Zone Faculty Advisor, and Bear Bridge mentor, earning the Outstanding Bear Bridge Faculty Mentor Award in 2023. Within her department, she has chaired the Undergraduate Committee and Personnel Committee, served on approximately three-dozen MA committees, and participated in five search committees, chairing two. She holds leadership positions such as Program Development and Inclusive Engagement Fellow in the Office of Inclusive Engagement for 2024-2025.

Troche's major publications include her monograph Death, Power and Apotheosis in Ancient Egypt: The Old and Middle Kingdoms (Cornell University Press, 2021), which explores religious beliefs in the afterlife during those periods. She co-edited Beyond Egypt: Relations and Imaginations of the Ancient Past (Journal of Ancient Egyptian Interconnections, 2022) and has books under contract: The God Ptah in Ancient Egyptian Religion and Society (Bloomsbury Press) and Life in Antiquity, a textbook co-authored with Bryan Brinkman (Routledge). Notable articles comprise “Examining the Grooves at the Ptah Temple, Karnak in Light of Comparanda” (Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt, 2023), “Virtual Reality Storytelling: Pedagogy and Applications” (Harvard Egyptological Series, 2023), and “Some Aspects of the Non-Royal Afterlife in the Later Old Kingdom” (Harvard Egyptological Series, 2022). Her awards include the Missouri State University Foundation Award for Excellence in Teaching, the university's highest teaching honor (2022), the Governor’s Award for Excellence in Education (2022), Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning Award for Excellence in Inclusive Teaching Practices (2021), and Women of Distinction Award (2020). Professionally, she is Governor on the American Research Center in Egypt Board since 2022, Chair of the ARCE Annual Meeting Committee (2024-2027), and co-chair of Archaeology of Egypt sessions for the American Society of Overseas Research (2023-2026). She co-founded the annual Missouri Egyptological Symposium and contributes to public engagement via lectures, media such as KSMU and History.com, and co-curating the Ancient Artifacts Abroad exhibition at the Springfield Art Museum (spring 2024).