HIST 278 - The Productive Past: Innovation and the Early Modern World

FC SSCI CD WINT

4 credits
Innovations do not occur in a vacuum, or spring fully-born from the mind of an isolated genius–they also are intimately embedded in the social, cultural, and biological contexts that produce them. This course examines the theories and practice of change through case studies from the early modern period (15th to 18th centuries): important innovations in economic, scientific, and medical epistemologies that shape our current views of knowledge, our bodies, and what we put into them. Using historical evidence as well as hands-on workshops, students will study the complexity of innovation, particularly the real world stickiness of the problems they purported to address and the consequences of their adoption.