HIST 4685 Early Modern Universities (also STS 4685) (ALC-AS, HST-AS) (HIST-HEU, HIST-HPE)
Wednesday: 11:15-1:45 plus Independent Research
Dr. Eleanor Webb
This course focuses on one of early modern Europe’s most influential and contentious institutions: the university. Universities were central pillars of premodern European society and played host to some of the period’s most consequential debates about politics, religion, and science. Universities were also the subject of controversy in their own right. By 1450, new technology, scientific and geographical discoveries, and religious upheavals prompted heated debates about the content and purpose of university education. Through close examination of texts and images, we will explore how professors, students, civic authorities, and religious leaders grappled to decide major questions about the universities’ future: who should control universities? Who should teach there? Should education be censored? Should new technologies – like printed books and telescopes – be integrated into teaching?
