by Weston Bensman, BGSU History major. This is one in a series of posts written by students in HIST 4800 in Spring, 2020, putting our world into historical context for the public.

Recent events have shown that video games may have other uses besides entertainment. In April 2019 Notre Dame cathedral caught fire and the structure was damaged extensively. Immediately after this disaster people in France and around the world called for a restoration and rebuild, but the difficulty of rebuilding the cathedral as close as possible to the original design was quickly realized. One of the biggest questions was whether the spire should be rebuilt after it collapsed during the fire. This is where Assassin’s Creed Unity can help as the creators of Assassins Creed attempt to be as historically accurate as possible when designing their games including architecture.   

by Jack Riegert, BGSU History major. This is one in a series of posts written by students in HIST 4800 in Spring, 2020, putting our world into historical context for the public.

While the thrill of local and world history can be one hell of a goose-chase, genealogy DNA test kits are growing to be a popular medium for people to pursue this. Genealogy isn’t just a study of the run of the mill tax records or census records; being in the 21^stcentury DNA testing is a new way to try to get an accurate analysis of your family’s history!  In the past five years, the growing industry of genealogy welcomed many new businesses and startups into the industry, businesses like 23andMe and Ancestry being the two largest. America is the melting pot, and most people have a general idea where their family comes from, sometimes indicated by last name, oral history, and skin color. 

by Anne Mier, BGSU History major. This is one in a series of posts written by students in HIST 4800 in Spring, 2020, putting our world into historical context for the public.

COVID-19 has been a stressful and scary time for a lot of people because their entire lives have been practically taken away from them. This virus is different from others because it can infect anyone, so there is no avoiding it.  In a time like this, it can be easy to put the blame on someone or a particular group. Especially when the first cases were being diagnosed and there wasn’t a lot of information, it was easy to jump to conclusions. Rather than blaming those who aren’t following the rules of social distancing, a lot of people have been blaming Chinese people or anyone that is perceived to be Asian for being the source of the virus.

by Victoria Masson, BGSU History major. This is one in a series of posts written by students in HIST 4800 in Spring, 2020, putting our world into historical context for the public.

In 1918, the world was fighting the “Spanish flu” which came from birds. It was thought to have come from Spain, but researchers showed that it came from New York. More than 50 million people have died from this according to the article “1918 Spanish Influenza Pandemic Versus COVID- 19″. (.https://www.biospace.com/article/compare-1918-spanish-influenza-pandemic-versus-covid-19/).  At that time there were no vaccines for it and currently no vaccines for COVID-19. The current pandemic helps us understand the past because it affected people all over the world.