Spring 2026 Courses Available
5b courses begin ________
Regisitration Checklist
Man vs. Microbes [SCI4-5b-Mon3-s26]
Study Group Leader (SGL) - Carl Lazarus
Location: This course will take place in person at 60 Turner Street. The room will be equipped with a HEPA air purifier.
Monday– Course Period 3 – 2:10-3:35pm ET
5 week course - April 13 - May 11
Description From the dawn of recorded history and even before, infectious diseases were the great scourge of mankind, particularly of young children. Some diseases were present all the time, others occurred in epidemics. In 1850 the top causes of death in the United States were all infectious diseases. Life expectancy at birth was 40 years, a little better than in ancient Greece. By 1900 it had risen to 49 years, by 1950 to 68, and by 2023 to 79.3. In 2024 none of the top 10 causes of death were primarily infectious. How did this progress happen? And why did it take almost 200 years from the first published observations of “animalcules” using microscopes until dangerous microbes were understood as the cause of these diseases? We will study the uneven history of this struggle and learn about the people who made notable contributions to this victory, often against stubborn resistance. Some of this progress depended on the late nineteenth century development of the germ theory of disease, though important advances happened even without this understanding. The war against microbes is not over, and we will see how we might still go backward.
No medical or scientific background is needed for this course.
Note: We will allow the term “microbes” to include viruses, though some would object to that usage.
Group Leadership Style More lecture than facilitated discussion.
Course Materials So Very Small: How Humans Discovered the Microcosmos, Defeated Germs--and May Still Lose the War Against Infectious Disease by Thomas Levenson
Preparation Time 1-2 hours/week.
Madness, Music, and Ghosts: Reading Hamlet [LIT12-5b-Mon3-s26]
Study Group Leader (SGL) - Avi Mendelson
Location: This course will take place virtually on Zoom. Participation in this course requires a device (ideally a computer or tablet, rather than a cell phone) with a camera and microphone in good working order and basic familiarity with using Zoom and accessing email.
Monday– Course Period 3 – 2:10-3:35pm ET
5 week course - April 13 - May 11
Description Shakespeare’s Hamlet—a perennial classic of English literature—is still rife with unnerving shocks and delightful confusions for today’s theatergoers: a melancholic prince seeks to enact vicious revenge on his uncle, who murdered his father and slept with his mother; a daughter is driven mad after her boyfriend gaslights her and then, accidentally, stabs her father to death; a hair-raising ghost shows up—possibly a figment of the imagination, the play suggests, or a shapeshifting demon—and he demands bloody vindication for his untimely demise. A tale full of mourning and incest, madness and malingering, ghastly specters and marauding pirates, Hamlet forces on its audience a confrontation with all things dramatic, if not supremely melodramatic.
As we read Hamlet closely, we’ll home in on a few different themes and images: madness (both Hamlet’s allegedly feigned madness and Ophelia’s mental decline), music (such as the ballads Ophelia sings when mad), and ghosts (King Hamlet’s phantasmal appearance early in the play). While grappling with Hamlet’s representation of madness, music, and ghosts, we will explore—for historical context—other 400-year-old documents on these topics. These documents may include medical books about madness; broadside ballads sold outside the theaters; and famous debates about the existence of ghosts, witches, and devils. Optional literary criticism will be provided too.
By the end of the course, we will have not only a better understanding of this timeless play, but also a more nuanced comprehension of the culture that brought it into being.
Please note: this course will not be recorded.
Group Leadership Style More facilitated discussion than lecture.
Course Materials Hamlet by William Shakespeare. Ann Thompson and Neil Taylor, editors. (The Arden Shakespeare Third Series). 2016. ISBN: 9781472518385
NOTE: There are two different versions of Hamlet in The Arden Shakespeare Third Series. One is called “Hamlet: Revised Edition,” and the other is called “Hamlet: The Texts of 1603 and 1623.” Please make sure to get the version called “Hamlet: Revised Edition.”
Additional readings will be provided via email.
Preparation Time Around 2-3 hours each week