Bio-Lit Talks sit at the cross section of Biology and Literature, two disciplines that undeniably feed into one another. Against the common backdrop of infectious diseases, we will discuss their interactions and intersections, exploring the nature of disease through the eyes of scientists, writers, and readers.
Structured as a four-event series and focusing on a new topic each week, join us as we delve, digress, and dissect into words of authors and mechanisms of pathogens: from Scottish texts of the 16th century to contemporary prose, from Victorian texts to Hispanic literature - witness easily digestible discussions on the plague, cholera, sexually transmitted infections, and novel pathogens.
Organised by postgraduate students at the University of Glasgow and featuring authors, researchers, and academics, this free event-series is open to Literature lovers, Science enthusiasts and everyone in between.
Event 3 – Wednesday, 24 November 2021
Poetry, Pestilence, Prescriptions: Plague biology in 16th century Scottish poetry and medical manuscripts
Plague outbreaks have been among the deadliest epidemics in history and have left behind a trail of sweeping societal changes. Responses to outbreak can be individual, social, or institutional: disease changes people and people change their culture. Following the Black Death, a succession of outbreaks between the fourteenth and eighteenth centuries shaped currents of science and literature and how the plague was conceptualised by society.
Prof. Christos Lynteris – medical anthropologist (University of St. Andrews) – Dr. Nicola Royan – professor in Older Scots literature (University of Nottingham) – and Dr. Boris Valentijn Schmid – specialist in the evolutionary and ecological dynamics of human diseases (University of Oslo) – will explore how we understand, perceive, and respond to the plague.
In a crossover of biomedicine, language, and literature, come along as we discover a disease that left a permanent mark on humanity like no other.
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