Fact, Fiction, or Both? A Discourse Approach to Historical Disease with Chris de Wet
Episode 12 - May 30, 2020
Chris de Wet (University of South Africa) discusses his work on discourse analysis, and how we can use it today to better our understanding of the social, cultural and psychological effects of past infectious diseases. The discussion focuses on the sixth century historian John of Ephesus, as well as on the third century bishop Cyprian. Chris, Merle and Lee reflect on the importance of discourse and how it shifts over time – whether in late antiquity or in the present with regard to COVID-19.
Further Reading
- Witakowski, Witold, trans. Pseudo-Dionysius of Tel-Mahre: Chronicle (Known Also As the Chronicle of Zuqnin) Part III. Translated Texts for Historians 22. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1996 (see pages 74-102 for John's account of the plague).
- Deferrari, R. et al. trans. St. Cyprian: Treatises. Fathers of the Church 36. Washington DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1958 (see the treatise "Mortality" on pages 195-224).
- Morony, Michael G. “‘For Whom Does the Writer Write?’: The First Bubonic Plague Pandemic According to the Syriac Sources.” Pages 59–86 in Plague and the End of Antiquity: The Pandemic of 541-750. Edited by Lester K. Little. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007.
- Taylor, S. What is Discourse Analysis. London: Bloomsbury, 2013.
- De Wet, CL. “The Care of the Soul in a Time of Plague: John of Ephesus’s Reaction to the Justinian Plague (ca. 543/44 CE).” Invited video lecture for the AIEP-IAPS peer-reviewed YouTube Channel, premiered 9 May 2020. Online (with transcript)
Our Guest
Chris de Wet,
Associate professor in the Department of Biblical and Ancient Studies at the University of South Africa
