Beginning Again

With another opportunity to begin again, I would like to elaborate upon my research idea. As I mentioned in my previous blog, I find the 14th Century to be a particularly fascinating time period. In particular, the Black Death and its overall cultural impact on society and art is incredibly intriguing. One specific motif in art I would like to explore more is the Danse Macabre. As I understand it now, the Danse Macabre is the inclusion of dancing skeletons in paintings from the 14th Century. I would like to research the origin and use of the Danse Macabre throughout this century. In addition, I will also ask questions about the larger cultural impacts of the Black Death. Seeing that this Plague was fatal to roughly 25 million people, the entire cultural landscape of Europe, and even the world, was changed. The drastic demise in much of the population led to things like increased social mobility, the rise of urbanization, and mistrust with the Catholic Church. I want to explore how those changes manifested themselves into the art, literature, and culture of the world. I am purposely keeping this topic slightly broad at the moment due to somewhat limited sources. There is an expansive secondary literature of the Black Death and the 14th century, I am just not certain exactly how much of that has to do with the culture. I am hoping that as I visit Kent Library and scour the online databases, I can find more primary and secondary sources that discuss the cultural impact of the Black Death on art, literature, and other humanities from this time period. Another source I am hoping to utilize if necessary would be one of the professors on campus. Dr. McAlister, I believe, specializes in Medieval and Middle Age European History. In her EH103 class, she does a whole section on the Plague. Many classes gloss over this event in history, meanwhile, Dr. McAlister makes the argument that this era is what ultimately led to the Renaissance. Because of her expansive knowledge of the 14th century, I am hoping to reach out to Dr. McAlister to help me locate good sources, especially if I find myself getting stuck. I can potentially see myself getting stuck in the weeds of my research. This is often the case when I chose my own topics to research. The biggest pitfall I am afraid of is not finding enough research that is relevant to my topic. There may be plenty of scholarly sources discussing the greater economic effects of the 14th century, or the effects the 14th century had on manorialism; however, that does not mean there is a lot of research being done on the cultural and artistic effects of the Black Death. I would also like to look to see if there are any parallels between the cultural effects in Europe and other parts of the world, like Asia and the Middle East. Generally, people focus on European cities during this time period, because they were hit particularly hard by the disease. Despite that, scientists have determined that the Plague originated somewhere in Asia and spread throughout much of the Eastern world as well as the Western. To take my research out of the typical eurocentric narrative, I want to open up my research to the effects of this disease on the world and how different cultures were changed. Some global questions I want to ask are, “Did motifs like the Danse Macabre manifest in the art of non-European cultures?” and “Did different culture explain the Plague in similar ways?”. Overall, I am excited to start researching this topic. I think researching the Black Death and its effects on different cultures throughout the world could produce some good historical work. Finally, I am looking forward to comparing and contrasting those differences around the world.