There was no escaping previous pandemics — such as the Black Plague (1347-51), the Yellow Fever epidemic
in Philadelphia (1793), or the Spanish Flu (1918) — except for those people wealthy enough not to need to go
to work and to be able to travel away from the area of contagion. The rest, poorer people, survived, or died.
Now in 2020-21 we are dealing with another pandemic, but the invention of the telephone, credit cards,
personal computers, and the world wide web means that we can stay in our own homes and continue life
almost as normal: purchase the necessities (food, medication) and even luxuries of life, continue schooling,
work office jobs, trade on the stock exchange, even socialize — sort of. In other words, this containment of, and
response to, COVID-19 is technology- driven, and could not have happened in 1347, in 1793, in 1918 — or
even in 1990!
However, as a result of these necessary technology-driven containment measures, our relationships with one
another, with society, and with the world as a whole seem to have rather abruptly changed. Communication
through screens (or masks) is now the norm and as individuals we are arguably more isolated: no more
experiencing our common humanity as part of a crowd in stores, schools, churches, offices, restaurants,
theaters, sports arenas, parks, airports, or anywhere else. Are our lives also more controlled than they used to
be as we receive orders to shelter in place, to quarantine, to give information about our past and present
whereabouts, to wear masks, to have our temperature taken, to be vaccinated, and to be tracked by cell phone
(on this topic, see this recent articleActions from the New York Times)? Are we also in the process of losing
something of our wholeness as humans as we find ourselves reduced to the level of a fingerprint, an eye, or
even just a body temperature — all readable by computer?!In light of all of this, your assignment is to think
about how life in general and your life in particular have changed since the pandemic hit us and about how the
Humanities — articles and chapters such as those you have read in this course and creative works of writing,
visual art, drama, and music — can help to make sense of all of this. As Robert E. Proctor says, “thinking
occurs best through comparison and contrast,” (p. xi) and in Chapter 2 of Defining the Humanities, he gives the
example of how Petrarch read Cicero’s letters and Homer’s Odyssey (composed many centuries before) and
found something in both of them that he could relate to in his grief and disorientation as the Black Plague
swept through Europe wiping away his friends, family, and sense of normality.
ote that these don’t need to be pieces that are “about” pandemics. Petrarch found that Cicero’s letters about
his grief at the death of his daughter and Homer’s description of Odysseus’ wanderings in the Odyssey both
spoke to his feelings of sadness and disorientation during the Black Plague. To feelings of isolation, you might
find relevant, for example, a novel written in 1719 about being stranded on a desert island and learning survival
skills (Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe). Or two novels, one written in 1932 by Aldous Huxley called Brave
New World, and another written in 1949, George Orwell’s Ninety Eighty Four, which are both about futuristic
societies in which the populace is controlled by governmental surveillance. On a more comical note, there is
the skit on governmental bureaucracy by Monty Python called “The Ministry of Silly Walks” which was first
aired on TV in 1970. As far as the visual arts go, and if we are seeking images of, say, individual isolation and
loneliness, the self-portraits of Frida Kahlo (Links to an external site.) could come to mind (and the animals she
portrays herself with remind me of one of the positive aspects of the recent lockdown — how animals and birds
seemed to be emboldened [did you notice? — read the article below about the Welsh goats] to come back and
take over what is theirs).
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