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Ellen Bakalian is an adjunct professor in the Classics and General Humanities Department at Montclair State University. She teaches Classical Mythology, and, unofficially, "how to write an essay." Dr. Bakalian’s specialty is medieval literature, and her work concentrates upon women in the works of John Gower, Geoffrey Chaucer, Ovid and Homer.

Dr. Bakalian is a former journalist who worked for ABC News for 17 years, where she was the Head Researcher for the award-winning Turning Point, and a producer and writer for ABCNewsonline. She wrote the original computer manuals for the network, and traveled the world teaching correspondents how to send scripts back to NYC in the pre-Internet days. Her ABC News production credits include the 1984-2000 election coverage, the 1988 and 1992 Democratic and Republican National Conventions, and the G7 Economic Summits in Reykjavik, Iceland, Brussels, Belgium, and Venice, Italy. Dr. Bakalian brings her skills as a journalist to the classroom by teaching her students to write effectively.

Dr. Bakalian is a contributing writer to TheAtlantic.com and other periodicals. Her articles have appeared in various publications, including The New York Times, The New Yorker, Ladies Home Journal, the New York Observer, NJ.com, The NY Daily News, and The Atlantic. Her book, “Aspects of Love in John Gower's Confessio Amantis,” was published by Routledge in 2003, and was published in paperback in 2014; updated in 2019. A chapter on Gower was published in a 2010 Cambridge Scholarly Press book entitled "Standing in the Shadow of the Master? Chaucerian Influences and Interpretations."