People and plagues: Diseases that changed history

How has illness shaped human history? This unit explores the social history of disease, health and wellness in a variety of chronological and geographical settings. We challenge a triumphalist understanding of medical history as the inexorable march of scientific conquest over pathogens, emphasising the complicated interaction of social structures, political forces, and medical knowledge. Topics may include: pre-modern understandings of disease and the body; the history of the germ theory of disease; colonial medicine; eugenics; sexually transmitted diseases; alcoholism; cancer and the tobacco industry; and the opioid crisis.