Professor: Jacob Steere-Williams, Ph.D.
Office: 310 Maybank Hall
Office Hours: Wednesdays 2:00-4:00 pm, or by appointment
Telephone:
Email:
(843) 953-3043 steerewilliamsj@cofc.edu
Course Overview
In this introductory course we will ask the fascinating historical question of how the social experience and cultural understanding of disease has shaped modern global history. We will explore how both chronic and infectious diseases have played a fundamental role in the development of modern modes of governance, public health, modern technologies, and a global economy. We will also examine how disease illuminates social attitudes about class, race, and colonialism in the period from the Enlightenment to the present. Using diverse examples such as cholera outbreaks in Europe, bubonic plague in India, syphilis in Africa, yellow fever in North
America and the Caribbean, and HIV/AIDS across the globe, this course demonstrates that the historical analysis of disease is integral to understanding both ‘modernity’ and ‘globalization’.
Course Objectives
This course serves a variety of goals. Part of the liberal arts tradition, learning to research, write, and think historically facilitates crucial skills in critical analytical thinking and deep reading that are at the heart of the mission at CofC. Though the basic tenet of the course is the provide you with an in-depth and focused narrative on many of the important themes in modern history, in the process this course will help you to become a better writer, editor, reader, and thinker.

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Required Books:
Hays, J.N. The Burdens of Disease, revised edition (Rutgers University Press, 2009).
Charles Rosenberg, The Cholera Years (University of Chicago Press, 1987).
Howard Markel, When Germs Travel (Vintage Press, 2005).
John Powell, Bring Out Your Dead (University of Pennsylvania Press, 1993).
Susan Reverby, Examining Tuskegee (University of North Carolina Press, 2009).
*Additional Readings will be posted on our Course Website on OAKS (It is your responsibility to either print off these readings or read them from a computer).
Course Requirements:
-Two Essays (4-6 pages) which you will write outside of class. (20% each, 40% total)
-Waring Archives Project (5% Archives visit +15% Paper = 20% total)
-Comprehensive Final Examination (20%)
-Five In-Class Reading Response Quizzes (2% each, 10% total)
-Participation and Attendance (10%)
**The Participation grade includes attendance, active contribution to discussion, and all group work.
** Paper Revision Policy: Because writing is a process, and one that you should strive to improve upon, I will allow you to revise the Waring Yellow Fever Essay and your First Essay on Cholera.
If you choose to do this I will average the initial and the revised grades. You will have two weeks from when the paper is returned to turn in your revised copy. You will not be able to revise the
Second Essay, as it is due the last week of class.
**Essays that are emailed to the instructor will not be accepted. Hard copies only. Essays will receive 10 points off for each day they are late.
** Students with special learning needs should inform me at the beginning of the course so that reasonable accommodations may be made
Grading Scale
A
A-
B+
94-100
90-93
87-89
C+ 77-79
C 74-76
C70-73
B 84-86
B- 80-83
D+ 67-69
D 64-66
D- 60-63
Anything below 60 constitutes a failing grade

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In-Class Courtesy:
Technology is a fundamental aspect of modern culture- it is also essential to university life and has an important role to play in the college classroom. In this sense, I fully encourage you to use laptops, ipads, etc. to enhance your experience in HIST 116. However, please don’t abuse such privileges. It is extremely disrespectful not only to me, but to your fellow classmates to check your email, facebook, twitter, etc. during class. If I see you doing this I will certainly confront you (and you will lose participation points); how discreetly depends upon what number of offense and its severity. This really is common sense, so just remember to be respectful.
Academic Honesty:
Academic dishonesty consists of any form of plagiarism or misrepresentation. Plagiarism is widely defined as intellectual theft of any kind. This includes, but is not limited to, representing someone else’s ideas or words as your own and failing to appropriately cite your sources. You must not plagiarize yourself by submitting work you have done for another course, in whole or in part. I have a zero tolerance policy on plagiarism. Depending on the severity, you will certainly fail an assignment and could fail this course if you plagiarize. If you have questions regarding plagiarism in general or concerns about your work and whether it is appropriate, you should see me in person BEFORE YOU SUBMIT AN ASSIGNMENT.
Plagiarism—using someone else’s words, ideas, or other intellectual work without properly giving them credit—will result in a failing grade on the assignment and/or class and a mandatory meeting with me. Please familiarize yourself with the definition of plagiarism and ways to avoid doing it unintentionally. The definition below can also be found on the Writing Center’s website.
MLA Handbook
(Gibaldi, Joseph, and Walter S. Achtert. MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers .
3rd ed. New York: The Modern Language Association of America, 1988. 21-25.)The
MLA Handbook defines plagiarism as the use of another person's ideas or expressions in your writing without giving proper credit to the source. The word comes from the Latin word plagiarius ("kidnapper"), and Alexander Lindey defines it as "the false assumption of authorship: the wrongful act of taking the product of another person's mind, and presenting it as one's own" ( Plagiarism and Originality [New York: Harper, 1952] 2). "In short, to plagiarize is to give the impression that you have written or thought something that you have in fact borrowed from someone else." This can include paraphrasing, copying someone else's writing word for word, or using ideas that aren't your own without proper citation. Plagiarism is often unintentional, and bad research habits can form early in elementary school. Unfortunately, these bad habits can continue throughout high school and college and may result in severe consequences, from failure in a course to expulsion.
To avoid these consequences, always cite your sources if you are unsure if you are plagiarizing (Gibaldi 21-25).
**As a College of Charleston Student you are bound to the HONOR CODE, which forbids lying, cheating, attempted cheating, stealing, attempted stealing and plagiarism.
For information on the CofC Honor System, see: http://studentaffairs.cofc.edu/honorsystem/index.php

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Course Schedule and Assigned Readings (subject to slight change throughout the term)
Week 1 The Hippocratic Revolution: Early Foundations of Western Medicine
Wednesday 9 January Course Introduction: No assigned readings
Friday 11 January Early Ideas about disease in the West
Readings :
1.
2.
Hays, Introduction and Chapter 1
Hippocratic Corpus, “Airs, Waters, Places”
OAKS
Week 2 Disease Goes Global: The Columbian Exchange- Smallpox and Syphilis
Monday 14 January World’s Collide: the Biological Realty of the Columbian
Exchange
Readings:
1.
Hays Chapter 4
Week 3
Wednesday 16 January Smallpox and the New World
Readings:
1.
Broken Spears- Excerpt from Native Account of the Conquest of Mexico
OAKS
2.
Las Casas, Destruction of the Indies OAKS
Friday 18 January
Readings:
Syphilis and the Old World
3.
Ulrich von Hutten, “A Treatise on the French Disease,”
OAKS
4.
Girolamo Fracastoro, “Syphilis,” 1530, OAKS
Disease and the American Revolution in the late 18 th century
Monday 21 January Lecture: “Fevered States”: Enlightenment Ideals, European
Governments, and Disease Concepts
Readings:

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Hays Chapter 6
Rene Descartes, “On Man”
OAKS
Alexander May, “Unity of Disease,” 1800
OAKS
Daniel Defoe, Journal of a Plague Year , excerpt, OAKS
Powell, Bring Out Your Dead, start reading
**Waring Project Assigned
Wednesday 23 January
Readings:
1.
2.
3.
Smallpox Inoculation in the Early American Republic
Cotton Mather, “A Letter about a Good Management Under the Distemper of the Measles,” 1739 OAKS
Zabdiel Boylston, “An Historical Account of the Small-pox,” 1730 OAKS
Edmund Massey, “A Sermon Against the Dangerous and Sinful Practice of
Inoculation,” 1730
OAKS
Friday 25 January
Readings:
1.
2.
3.
Yellow Fever, Quarantine, and the Young Republic
John Mitchel Mason, Yellow Fever Sermon, 1793 OAKS
U.S. Statute on Quarantine, 1796 OAKS
U.S. Statute on Quarantine, 1799 OAKS
** In Class Reading Response Quiz 1: Topic = Smallpox
Week 4 Waring Archives Visit and Project
Monday 28 January
Readings:
Waring Archives Visit on Yellow Fever
1. Powell, Bring Out Your Dead
Wednesday 30 January
Readings:
Waring Archives Visit on Yellow Fever
1. Powell, Bring Out Your Dead
Friday 1 February In Class Work on Waring Projects
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Readings:
1. Powell, Bring Out Your Dead
Week 5 Disease and the French and Haitian Revolutions
Monday 4 February Democracy a Disease?
Readings:
1.
Richard Sheridan, “From Jamaican Slavery to Haitian Freedom,”
OAKS
Wednesday 6 February Slavery, and the Haitian Revolution
Readings:
1.
2.
M. Gregoire, “Letter to the Citizens of Color and Free Negroes of Saint-
Domingue,” 1791
OAKS
Michel Etienne Descourtilz, “History of the Disasters in Saint-Domingue,”
1795 OAKS
Friday 8 February
Readings:
Public Health and the Consequences of Revolution
1.
Voltaire, Candide , 1759, selection OAKS
Week 6 The Industrial Revolution I: Cholera and Commerce
Monday 11 February America in 1832: Jacksonian Democracy, Manifest Destiny, and Heroic Medicine in the Age of Miasma
Readings:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Hays, Chapter Seven
Benjamin Rush, “Lecture to Philadelphia Medical Students” OAKS
Samuel Thomson, “System of Practice” 1812
OAKS
Dewey, Cholera Sermon OAKS
Rosenberg, The Cholera Years , begin reading

Wednesday 13 February Europe in 1832: Industrialization and Urbanization
Readings:
1.
2.
Thomas Carlyle, “Chartism” OAKS
Rosenberg, The Cholera Years , continue reading
Friday 15 February John Snow and the Communication of Cholera
Readings:
1.
John Snow, “On the Mode and Communication of Cholera,” 1854,
OAKS
2.
Rosenberg, The Cholera Years , continue reading
**In Class Reading Response Quiz 2: Cholera
**ESSAY 1 ASSIGNED: Topic = Cholera
Week 7 The Bacteriological Revolution: The Germ Theory
Monday 18 February French Pathological Anatomy
Readings:
1.
2.
Hays, Chapter 10, 214-242
Rosenberg, The Cholera Years
**Waring Project Paper DUE
Wednesday 20 February British Vital Statistics and Microscopy
Readings:
1. Rosenberg, The Cholera Years
Friday 22 February German and American Bacteriology: Bubonic Plague in
Chinatown
1.
2.
3.
Charles Chapin, “The Present State of the Germ Theory of Disease,” 1885,
OAKS
Markel, When Germs Travel, Chapter Two
Rosenberg, The Cholera Years
Week 8 The Industrial Revolution II: Tuberculosis, Poverty, and Immigration
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Monday 25 February A Disease of Poverty- Tuberculosis
Readings:
1.
2.
Hays, Chapter 8
Markel, When Germs Travel , Chapter One
Wednesday 27 February Saranac Lake and the Rise of the Sanatorium
Readings:
1. National Anti-TB Society- Modern Health Crusade OAKS
Friday 1 March Film on TB Sanatoria
**In-Class Reading Response Quiz 3: Topic = Tuberculosis
Week 9
*** SPRING BREAK- 2 March – 10 March
Immigration and the Rise of American Progressivism
Immigration and American Progressivism Monday 11 March
Readings:
1.
2.
3.
Voices from Ellis Island, OAKS
Hays, Chapter Nine
Markel, When Germs Travel , Chapter Three
Wednesday 13 March American Imperialism, Hawaii, and Leprosy
Readings:
1.
Hawaii Board of Health, on Leprosy, 1886, OAKS
Friday 15 March Film: Molokai or Triumph at Carville
**ESSAY 1 DUE BY FRIDAY- HARD COPY ONLY
Week 10 WWI and the Spanish Influenza in Focus
Monday 18 March World War I and Influenza
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Readings:
1. Crosby, OAKS
Wednesday 20 March Film : Influenza, 1918- American Experience
Friday 22 March Film : Influenza, 1918- American Experience
**In-Class Reading Response Quiz 4: Topic = Influenza 1918
**ESSAY 2 ASSIGNED: Topic = Tuskegee Syphilis
Week 11 Chronic Disease
Monday 25 March
Epidemiology and the Inter-War Years
The Epidemiological Transition in Focus
Readings:
1.
Hays, Chapter 11, p.243-282
Wednesday 27 March Cancer and Risk Factor Epidemiology
Readings:
1.
Richard Doll and Bradford Hill, “Smoking and Lung Cancer study” OAKS
Friday 29 March Cancer Continued
Week 12 Shell-Shocked: Mental Health in WWII
Monday 1 April Lecture: Mental Health in Focus
Readings:
1. TBD, see OAKS
Wednesday 3 April
Readings:
1.
Film, The Snake Pit
Begin Reading Examining Tuskegee
Friday 5 April Film, The Snake Pit
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Readings:
1. Continue Reading Examining Tuskegee
**In Class Reading Response Quiz 5: Topic = Snake Pit
Week 13 Disease, Human Rights, and Human Experimentation: Tuskegee
Monday 8 April
Readings:
1.
2.
A Short History of Human Experimentation: The ‘Nazi Doctors’
Continue Reading Examining Tuskegee
Nazi Doctors Reading, OAKS
Wednesday 10 April Examining Tuskegee I: The Story
Readings:
1. Continue Reading Examining Tuskegee
Friday 12 April
1.
Examining Tuskegee II: The Consequences and Civil Rights
Continue Reading Examining Tuskegee
Week 14 HIV/AIDS
Monday 15 April Lecture: Stigma and the Beginning of HIV/AIDS
Readings:
1.
Hays, Chapter Twelve
Wednesday 17 April
Readings:
Discussion: HIV/AIDS in Focus
2.
Markel, When Germs Travel , Chapter Five
Friday 19 April HIV/AIDS, continued
**ESSAY 2 DUE- HARD COPY ONLY
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Week 15 Conclusions: Disease and Public Health Today
Monday 22 April
Readings
1.
2.
Lecture: Emerging and Re-emerging Infectious Disease
Markel,
Markel,
When Germs Travel
When Germs Travel
, Chapter Six
, Epilogue
Wednesday 24 April Final Exam Review
**FINAL EXAM- Location, Date and Time to be Announced in class
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