Profs and Pints Online presents: “How Diseases Drive History,” with Andrew Latham, professor of political science at Macalester College and author of Theorizing Medieval Geopolitics: War and World Order in the Age of the Crusades

[This talk will remain available in recorded form at the link given here for tickets and access.]

Before the onset of COVID-19 last year, few people around today probably thought disease could be a significant driver of human history.  Not so anymore.

Now, people are beginning to understand that the relatively minor changes COVID-19 has already ushered in or accelerated–telemedicine, remote work, social distancing, the death of the handshake, online shopping, the virtual disappearance of cash and so on–have begun to change their way of life. They may not be sure whether all these changes will outlive the pandemic. And they may be uncertain whether these changes are for good or ill. But one people alive today now feel in ways they didn’t before: disease can shape and reshape the course of human history.

Join Professor Andrew Latham, who teaches a class titled “Plagues, Pandemics and Politics,” for an interactive, online talk in which you’ll learn how several major past pandemics shaped the world we inhabit today and gain insights into how COVID-19 might bend the arc of our history and shape the world inhabited by future generations.

He’ll discuss how past pandemics tended to shape human affairs in three ways: By profoundly altering societies’ fundamental worldview; by upending core economic structures, and by changing the balance of powers among nations. And he’ll take us on scholarly trip through time to examine how past pandemics such as the Black Death and plague of Justinian brought such change about.

You’ll emerge from the talk with a much better understanding of what kind of world we might find ourselves living in as a result of the jarring year we have had.

Profs & Pints Online: How Diseases Drive History