HIST 1025

Medieval Plague, Modern Pandemic:

Overview

“Medieval Plague, Modern Pandemic” presents the history of the Black Death (1347-1353 A.D./C.E.), caused by the Yersinia pestis bacterium, as an example for evaluating the evolving global coronavirus pandemic of 2019 and beyond.

“Let me say, then, that one thousand, three hundred, and forty-eight years had passed since the fruitful Incarnation of the Son of God when the deadly plague arrived in the noble city of Florence, the most beautiful of any in Italy.” 

Although these words and their phrasing are antiquarian --  we understand their meaning. These translated thoughts of the Italian Renaissance humanist Giovanni Boccacio appear in his mid-fourteenth century collection of novellas, Decameron. Yes, in the year 1348, the Yersinia pestis bacterium arrived in Italy and unleashed among the most destructive communicable diseases, the Plague, and a global pandemic that was 60 to 90% fatal within three to six days after the appearance of its symptoms.  Transmitted by seafaring, flea-infested rats to the Italian Peninsula in 1347, over the course of six years it indiscriminately struck European and Mediterranean populations. The mortality rates across European Jewish, Christian, and Islamic populations were devastating – approximately 30 to 35 percent in England and central Europe, 40 to 50 percent in Scandinavia, and as high as 50 to 60 percent in Spain, Italy, and France. In Islamic Egypt, over 200,000 persons perished in the city of Cairo. It was the Middle Ages’ Black Death of 1347 to 1353, and it forever changed the course of human history.

We will march through several fundamental issues during this course pertaining to culture, religion, economics, politics, science, and the natural world so that we can better understand the medieval plague in relationship to the present global coronavirus pandemic.

Learning Objectives

The intent of this course is to create a place for discussing the medieval Black Death as a way to for us to examine, to understand, and to reflect on the present global coronavirus pandemic of 2019 and beyond.

• Examine the culture and religious diversity of the Middle Ages.
• Understand the development of Renaissance Humanism and its connection to the Black Death.
• Evaluate social, religious, cultural, political, economic, and scientific issues during and after the plague.
• Interpret the reasons behind the explosion of anti-Semitic violence against Jewish communities before, during, and after the plague. 
• Interpret how medieval societies changed due to plague.
• Create digital texts, art, multimedia as symbols of medieval life and Renaissance Humanism.
• Reflect on the similarities and differences of medieval plague and modern pandemics and how they impact past and present lives.

Readings and Lectures 

All readings for this course will be new texts prepared and posted to Canvas by Professor Martinez, academic journal articles or newspaper articles posted to Canvas, and/or open-access Internet materials (such as museum websites). Multimedia video lectures will be posted to Canvas.

Assignments

This course satisfies the Compass Curriculum’s Explore, Writing Intensive, and Inclusiveness (Global Diversity) requirements and employs the following assignments:

• Medieval Plague Digital Diary (70% of total grade).  
• Renaissance Humanist Digital Project (15% of total grade).
• Digital Reflections (15% of total grade).

My Teaching Approach

My approach focuses on three elements: personal best efforts, improvement, and engagement. Although I must evaluate your work in relationship to your peers, I am most interested in your personal effort to do your best. I take into consideration your improvement over time and the level of effort you dedicate to your work. 

General Guidelines

• Complete all assignments on time and per instructions. Always ask questions if you are unclear about an assignment. Late work is not accepted.
• Abide by the university’s Student Code of Conduct. For specifics see: https://www.uccs.edu/dos/student-conduct.
• If you have a disability for which you are requesting an accommodation, you are encouraged to contact Disability Services (DS).

Details

• Dr. Roger L. Martínez, Associate Professor and Chair, Department of History, Columbine Hall 2046, ph 719.255.4070, rmartin8@uccs.edu
• Office Hours: In person Thu/Fri 11 am - 12:30 pm; On Zoom same times.
• Teaching Assistant: Ms. Kristy Wilson, kwilson2@uccs.edu 
• Class Meetings: Online Course.
• Course handouts, reading packet, and grades posted on UCCS Canvas.

Assignments

This course satisfies the Compass Curriculum’s Writing Intensive and Inclusiveness (Global Diversity) requirements, the College of Letters, Arts, and Sciences’ Cultural Diversity requirement, and employs the following assignments:

Medieval Plague Digital Diary (70% of total grade).
You will become a medieval Renaissance Humanist and record a weekly diary that draws from the historical events, personages, and details revealed in our course readings, materials, and lectures. Your diary will be written in first-person and use the voice and knowledge of a 14th-century elite. Your own complicated perspective, which draws from many religious and cultural perspectives, also shapes your brilliance and ability to create the new way of life that was characteristic of the Renaissance.

The purpose of your diary is to assume the perspective of a Renaissance Humanist who examines the human condition and decides they must free themselves from the confines of the devastating disease and “old ways of thinking” and now must explore new ways of “being” a person. No longer required to follow the profession of your father and your father’s father, you will be liberated to choose a new humanistic profession as a writer, artist, alchemist, philosopher, architect, sculptor, statesman, etc. As a Renaissance humanist, you desire to be an agent of change who reflects the emerging values of the Renaissance, which valued the restoration of the Ancient values of Greece and Rome that have been deeply influenced by the injection of Islamic and Jewish thinkers. With your special knowledge and access to as well as new explorations of art and sculpting, literature and writing, architecture, political statesmanship and philosophy, rhetoric and oratory, science and experimentation, and history and the recording of humanity’s achievements and losses.

• Your weekly diary will (1) document the impact of the medieval plague and (2) delve into your new perspective as a Renaissance humanist. 
• Each week you will record a total of eleven entries that are approximately 300-500 words in length using your own Canvas Medieval Plague Digital Diary, which shared with and viewable by all students in our class. You are encouraged to incorporate imagery, art, video, music, or other non-text items into your diary.  
• Collectively, all of our course diaries will form A New History of the Medieval Plague, which will become our digitally-published course project.

Renaissance Humanist Digital Project (15% of total grade).
Assuming your humanistic profession, you will create a digital project that merges the old with the new. Although you will be provided guidelines for your digital project, your creativity is the only issue of concern and importance. Novel (re-envisioned, never before seen, unique, bizarre, strange, shocking, enticing, harmonizing) forms of digital writing and language use, artistic projects, visual creations and mixed digital media, auditory and sound experimentations, constructions of objects and places and buildings, mixtures of media, etc.

Digital Reflections (15% of total grade).
You will create three (3) recorded video, oral, or multimedia presentations of 2-4 minutes in length that explore how historical and contemporary responses to plague/coronavirus are similar, different, or otherwise comparable. For example, you will choose to reflect on a cultural, religious, political, economic, scientific, or environmental issue that manifested itself during the medieval plague. Using either the embedded tools with Canvas, or software of your choosing, you will have complete liberty to communicate what is important about issue — that is — why and how did it impact medieval society? Moreover, has this medieval issue become re-emergent during our 21st century? Do we see or are we experiencing similar issues during a present-day life-changing event? These presentations will also ask you to consider how you, your family and friends, and those you know have been impacted/not been impacted by significant historical events (for example, the coronavirus pandemic of 2019-???) during your lifetime.