College of Arts and Sciences

Professor John Grabowski appeared on the Ideastream podcast this week to discuss the Spanish Flu epidemic of 1918, and what we can learn from its history. Professor Grabowski also discussed the reopening of society during that historical pandemic, and how it applies to our current situation. The episode also...

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Professor John Broich recently published a piece in The Daily Beast titled "Lessons of a Hero From the Plague for Surviving the Coronavirus." Professor Broich offers a brief history of Cristofano Cessini, an elected board of health official in the Italian town of Prato when the black plague was...

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Professor Peter Shulman appeared in an article recently published on usatoday.com, in which he comments on the history of the Defense Production Act and President Trump's messaging around enacting the act during the current pandemic. "It's not about punishment; it's about mobilization," Shulman said. "It's making companies that normally we would...

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Professor John Grabowski recently appeared on Ideastream to discuss a virus outbreak which occurred in Cleveland long before even the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic. The illness, which was often referred to as the "ague," infecting many of Cleveland's earliest settlers in the area we now call Whiskey Island. Professor...

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Tarun Jella was featured in The Daily today, offering historical perspective on the current COVID-19 pandemic. Jella, who is currently a student in the CWRU Medical School, graduated from the Department of History in 2017 after completing thesis research on the 1918 outbreak of Spanish flu in Cleveland. Jella...

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In a time of global crisis, the importance of historical context gets thrown into the limelight in renewed ways. The satirical online newspaper, The Onion, published an article titled "Historians Politely Remind Nation to Check What's Happened in Past Before Making Any Big Decisions," which, though it was published...

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Professor Peter Shulman recently published a piece on washingtonpost.com, which traces the history of the Defense Production Act (DPA) in the U.S. during times of national crisis. Professor Shulman speaks to the urgent need for medical supplies in the current COVID-19 pandemic, and calls for President Trump to invoke...

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In light of the current global health pandemic, cleveland.com published an article tracing the history of the 1918 Spanish Flu in Cleveland and comparing it to the current coronavirus outbreak. The article draws heavily on the research done by History Department graduate Tarun Jella, who is currently a senior...

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Professor John Broich, who specializes in race, colonialism, and nationalism, recently wrote and published an article titled "The Bedside Reading of the Post-Trump Nationalists." The article, which appears in Mel Magazine's online platform, traces the history of Nationalism in the U.S., and the dangerous rhetoric surrounding it today. Read...

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Henry Eldridge Bourne Professor of History Renee Sentilles recently contributed to the Cleveland Museum of Art's blog, "The Thinker." Professor Sentilles, who specializes in the History of American Women, traces the history behind the women working in the Tiffany Studios as the role of women in America changed over...

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