He is Ronald Nelson Smith Chair in Classics and Christian Origins, and director of the Institute for the Study of Antiquity and Christian Origins, at the University of Texas at Austin.
In 2011, White won the University of Texas' Robert W. Hamilton Book Award, a $10,000 prize, for his newest book Scripting Jesus (2010).
White also won the same award in 2006 for his book From Jesus to Christianity.
[2] In addition, White is Project Director of the Ostia Synagogue Area Excavations, "Ostia Synagogue Masonry Analysis Project" or OSMAP, an archaeological field project to reevaluate the area around the ancient synagogue of Ostia Antica, the port city of ancient Rome.
White has served as consultant and co-writer, as well as being featured in, two PBS/Frontline documentaries: From Jesus to Christ: The First Christians and Apocalypse!