Athanassakis was born in the small village of Astrochori in northwestern Greece (Ήπειρος). His deep appreciation for civil and intellectual liberties were formed by his experiences of World War II, the Greek Civil War, and the Regime of the Colonels, or the junta years. These collective experiences set the foundation for his devotion to education. Athanassakis studied foreign (non-Greek) languages from a young age and eventually became interested in Scandinavian languages, including Icelandic and Inuktitut. His study of historical linguistics focused on roots and the evolution of variants, especially in Sanskrit and Germanic languages.

Athanassakis left his native Greece on a partial scholarship in the late 1950s. He received his undergraduate degree from Lincoln University in Pennsylvania, one of the US’s most distinguished and oldest African American academic institutions for higher learning. While at Lincoln, he won the Phi Beta Kappa award and was class valedictorian in 1961. Among his fondest memories of that time was sharing the stage with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. who was that year’s graduation speaker. Athanassakis went on to study Classics at the University of Pennsylvania as a Penn Fellow and earned his doctorate from Penn before teaching at Scripps, Claremont, and finally at UC Santa Barbara.

In large part because of his own background, Athanassakis’ career was heavily invested in program building with international education and diversity first and foremost in his mind. From 1994 to 2000 Athanassakis directed UC Santa Barbara’s Education Abroad Program (EAP), he was Director of Summer Travel Study to Greece for nine years, and from 2003 to 2010, he lived on UCSB’s campus among the students as the first Professor in Residence. His mission was to enhance the cultural experience of students and to foster a sense of community. During his tenure as Director of EAP, the program grew to include new countries and he founded international internship initiatives. In addition, he assisted the National University of Iceland and UCSB in reaching an agreement of cooperation and he helped establish two exchange programs in Turkey: one with Bilkent University and another with Middle Eastern Technical University (METU).

Athanassakis’ career includes a variety of initiatives and accomplishments of which he is most proud. As APA Speaker for the American Bicentennial between 1974-1976, he organized seminars on aspects of the US Constitution. In the late 70s he was a fellow at the Center for Hellenic Studies, Washington D.C., and he devoted himself to the study of criminal justice in the Homeric Odyssey. Keen interest in the subject then led him to Iceland, first to the Institute for Norse Studies in the summer of 1976 as a Fulbright scholar and again as a National Endowment for the Humanities grantee. At both times he studied Icelandic as well as the subject of crime and punishment during Viking times. A Humboldt grantee at the University of Würzburg (Germany), he was a guest scholar and deepened his understanding of German Hellenism. He later became director of the UC Education Abroad Program at the University of Lund, Sweden. Athanassakis became chairman of the UCSB Department of Classical Studies from 1981—83 and he chaired the Humanities Division at the University of Crete from 1984—86. Always interested in international education, he built an exchange program between the University of Crete and Princeton University. As a Guggenheim Fellow he researched the topic “Honor in the West Mountains of Crete” and published widely on the topic following his time as a fellow.

Athanassakis is a member of many organizations, including the Fulbright Alumni Association, the American Philological Association, as well as of the American Institute of Archeology. He is currently Vice President of the Spartan Association and advisor to the newly founded Association for the Protection and Promotion of Antiquities in Paros.