Podcast

Adia Benton (Northwestern University) discusses the 2014 West African Ebola outbreak and why Ebola, as a charismatic disease, has such a powerful hold over our imagination.

Chinmay Tumbe (Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad) discusses his new book, The Age of Pandemics, that focuses on the cholera, plague, and the 1918 Influenza pandemics in India.

Merle and Lee discuss a recent article that they wrote on the Justinianic Plague that has been published, and tie it to some of the discussions they’ve had on the podcast.

Guy Beiner (Ben-Gurion University of the Negev) discusses how people and societies have forgotten and remembered the 1918 Influenza Pandemic over the last century.

John McNeill (Georgetown University) discusses the state of the field of environmental history including its development, what it looks like now, and where it might be going.

Susan Jones (University of Minnesota) discusses the key role of animals in the spread of diseases and the outbreak of epidemics, focusing on plague in Soviet Central Asia.

A.J. Herrmann (Director of Policy for Mayor Quinton Lucas of Kansas City, Missouri) talks about how he helped develop and implement Covid policies for Kansas City and the responses and difficulties in the city since March.

Katie Foss (Middle Tennessee State University) talks about her recent work on the role of the media in shaping how we think and remember epidemics in U.S. history.

David Pickel (Stanford University) discusses malaria in the ancient world with a focus on Roman Italy.

Mary Brazelton (University of Cambridge) comes on the podcast to discuss vaccinations in China during the 20th century.

Elliott Bowen (Nazarbayev University) discusses syphilis and sexual health in Hot Springs, Arkansas with Merle and Lee

Jacob Steere-Williams (College of Charleston) talks to Lee and Merle about typhoid fever and the development of epidemiology as a field of study.

Tara Malanga (Rutgers University) joins Merle and Lee to discuss indigenous perceptions of disease in the context of post-Contact Mexico.

Elise Mitchell (NYU) talks about her work on smallpox vaccinations and forced inoculations for enslaved people in the Caribbean during the 17th and 18th centuries.

Jim Harris (Ohio State University) discusses the development of vaccinations and anti-vaccination sentiments since the 18th century.

Michael Vann (California State University, Sacramento) joins Merle and Lee to talk about the rat hunt following a plague outbreak in colonial Vietnam.

Mari Webel (University of Pittsburgh) talks to Merle and Lee about sleeping sickness and the impact of colonization in East Africa.

Merle and Lee discuss the late antique Justinianic Plague (c. 541-750), their current topic of research.

Nancy Tomes (Stony Brook) discusses the development of Germ Theory and how its ideas spread through advertising and other popular media.

Priscilla Wald (Duke University) comes on the podcast to discuss the outbreak narrative, a common way through which we understand infectious diseases.

Merle and Lee discuss the late antique Justinianic Plague (c. 541-750), their current topic of research.

Vincent Racaniello (Columbia University) joins Merle and Lee to discuss developments in the field of virology over the past few decades.

Amir Afkhami (George Washington University) talks about modern cholera pandemics with a focus on their impact on Iran.

Jordan Pickett (U Georgia) comes on the podcast to discuss archaeology and potential signals of infectious diseases in archaeological finds.

Liat Kozma (Hebrew University of Jerusalem) discusses the development of medicine in the Middle East.

Liat Kozma (Hebrew University of Jerusalem) discusses the development of medicine in the Middle East.

John Haldon (Princeton University) discusses the idea of resilience to systemic crises with a focus on the seventh-century Byzantine Empire.

Robert Alpert (Fordham and Hunter College) discusses how pandemics are depicted in film, and what might we learn about the past from these films.

Seth Archer (Utah State) discusses the various diseases that devastated Native Americans focusing on their impact in Hawaii.

Chris De Wet joins Merle and Lee to discuss his work on using discourse analysis to better understand late antique disease through the eyes of the people who experienced them.

Guy Geltner and Janna Coomans join Merle and Lee to talk about what public health was like in medieval cities and why their work has important political implications for today.

Chris De Wet joins Merle and Lee to discuss his work on using discourse analysis to better understand late antique disease through the eyes of the people who experienced them.

Julia Simons talks to Merle and Lee about the evidence for tuberculosis and its effects around the Ancient World.

Christos Lynteris, a leading expert on the Third Plague Pandemic, discusses the Third Pandemic and its impacts during the 20th century.

Thomas Zimmer speaks with Merle and Lee about the emergence and development of global public health from World War Two to the present.

Merle and Lee discuss the late antique Justinianic Plague (c. 541-750), their current topic of research.

Fushcia Hoover sits down to talk to Merle and Lee about the connections between environmental justice and the impact of COVID-19 on a community level.

Michelle Smirnova, a sociologist (University of Missouri, Kansas City), joins Merle and Lee to discuss some of the present-day effects of COVID-19 in the US.

Merle and Lee talk to Phil Slavin about the evidence for the impact of the Black Death in Central Asia before it arrived more famously in Europe.

Abigail Agresta joins the podcast to discuss the most infamous pandemic in history – the Black Death.

Merle and Lee have their first guest, Alex Chase-Levenson, on the podcast to discuss historical quarantine and its relationship to social distancing in the present.

Merle and Lee discuss the late antique Justinianic Plague (c. 541-750), their current topic of research.

Merle and Lee discuss the most famous disease in human history, the plague, and give an overview of its impact.

An introductory episode in which Merle and Lee discuss the podcast and introduce themselves.