This course is a research seminar offered in partnership with the Mass General Postdoc Association (MGPA) Science Communications Committee. Each week, two research fellows (MDs or PhDs) at the Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School will deliver a presentation on their ongoing research. Informative talks will be followed by interactive Q&A sessions with class participants. The far-ranging topics will cover different fields in medical research, including neuroscience, oncology, cardiology, and epidemiology. No prior scientific knowledge is expected from course participants, and no weekly preparation is required. The…

The Massachusetts Bay Colony and the Plymouth Plantation are generally thought of as communities of refuge for English religious dissidents. They were also entrepreneurial ventures financed by English investors. This course examines the history of these ventures and some of the entrepreneurial characters engaged in these enterprises. At the beginning of the 17th century, three major drivers in England stimulated these ventures. First was commercial speculation among businessmen. Second were the dreams of feudal estates in the minds of the nobility. Third was the desire for religious freedom…

Edith Wharton and Henry James, although 20 years apart in age, were the closest of friends. They shared their lives, their friends, and their literary careers. Henry James was seldom free with his praise, except for Edith. The only other close literary friendship James maintained was with Constance Fenimore Woolson, whose suicide was wrenching to him. This course will look closely at these friendships. We will read two very short novels by Henry James, Washington Square and Daisy Miller, along with The Custom of the Country and Summer…

Francisco Goya (1746-1828), one of Spain’s most famous artists, was one of the last of the Old Masters and the first of the Moderns. He was the creator of menacing and melancholy images in oils; a master of enigmatic, satirical, and revolutionary drawings and etchings; and the champion of the Spanish people, recording their lives and sufferings in war. Goya’s moods were many -- from the gaiety and tenderness of the tapestry cartoons to the mysterious darkness of the so-called “Black Paintings,” executed in his old age. This…

Chances are that you have never heard of the Macchiaioli: an artistic movement similar to French Impressionism that represented a rebellion against the Florentine Academy. One of the earliest developments in European modern art, this movement and its artists are often overlooked outside of Italy. The paintings of the Macchiaioli are worth exploring for the authenticity with which they captured the world around them as Italy became a nation and traditional rural life was giving way to modernity. While the Macchiaioli artists were working in Italy, across the…

John F. Kennedy begins his book Profiles in Courage as follows: “This is a book about the most admirable of human virtues – courage…and these are the stories of the pressures experienced by eight United States Senators and the grace with which they endured.” This course will demonstrate that physicians, at times, are called upon to display courage as well.   Ignaz Simmelweiss, a Hungarian physician, championed hand washing to combat postpartum infection and is known as the “savior of mothers.” Frances Kelsey, a young physician at the…

The House of Habsburg took root in the 13th century at a small castle in the canton of Aargau in modern day Switzerland. Over the ensuing centuries it expanded and mutated to dominate Central Europe, the Low Countries, parts of Italy, Iberia, large tracts of North and South America, and the Philippines at various times. It was the first empire on which the sun never set, and its head usually held the elective title of Holy Roman Emperor. This growth was accomplished not so much by conquest, but…

This course tells the story of the Mamluks, a slave dynasty and founders of a powerful sultanate that lasted for two and a half centuries (1250-1517). The sultanate was a military state whose frontiers extended from Egypt to Abyssinia (Ethiopia) and the Hijaz (Saudi Arabia), but its power was concentrated in Cairo (al-Qahira). The “Slave Kings” stopped the Mongol invasion and drove the Crusaders from the Holy Land.   The Mamluk sultans were prolific patrons of architecture and contributed immensely to the fabric of historic Cairo, which reached…

This course will examine archetypes of evil and ‘fallen’ women through the lens of Victorian writers, artists, and social mores. We will read and review extracts from Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre and Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations, considering their female protagonists against the backdrop of Victorian society and its cultural norms. As we explore the characters of Jane Eyre, Bertha Rochester, Miss Havisham and Estella, we’ll see how rising feminism begins to challenge deeply rooted female stereotypes. We will also discuss how some key poems, extracts from other novels,…