Death from Medieval Relics to Forensic Science

From CSI: Crime Scene Investigation to Ghost Busters to murder mysteries, western society finds death and dead bodies both fascinating and horrifying. This lecture course considers how the western world has dealt with life’s most fundamental truth – all humans die – by looking at the history of death and dead bodies from the Middle Ages up to the early twentieth century. Topics include the worship of Christian relics, Catholic and Protestant conceptions of the “good death,” body snatching and dissection, society’s fascination with murder, execution as legalized death, forensic science and dead bodies, and ghosts. P