Living Through History: Corona 2020History students at Te Herenga Waka Victoria University of Wellington plot covid-19 as it happens, as it feels, and as events in the longer time span of pandemics, plagues and quarantine.
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Students in HIST 316 New Zealand Social History were in week 3 of their first semester study when the global covid-19 pandemic took on more serious aspects. As course co-ordinators we decided to take the course online.
We had been talking about Time: how historians organise accounts of the past by identifying significant turning points, or dividing off one period of time from another, or by describing longer processes of change - and continuity.
Within days we had the experience of abrupt and total disruption of our lives. This was History happening in front of and inside us!
Five days later New Zealand was under lockdown, alert level 4, meaning all but essential businesses were closed, the borders were closed, almost all internal travel came to a stop. Universities were closed and many students in the class left Wellington to return to homes elsewhere around the country, and across the world. The HIST 316 class in 2020 included five students on exchange from the United States. They travelled back to the US, but have continued to study and post to the blog.
Taking the course online meant changes to how we met, and the work we asked our students to undertake. An alternative assignment to the major research assignment initially set for the course, was devised. This alternative was for students to create a series of postings to a class blog: Living through History: Corona 2020.
As Course-Co-ordinator I began the blog as we went into lockdown. Students began posting to it as the university suspension period came to an end on 28 April.
The blog was created initially within Blackboard, the digital platform supporting teaching at the University. But the students’ work deserves a wider audience so we have brought it into this place to make it available to all.
The blog postings can be read by time, by author (follow the name tag), by theme.
Charlotte Macdonald, Professor of History, Te Herenga Waka Victoria University of Wellington
We had been talking about Time: how historians organise accounts of the past by identifying significant turning points, or dividing off one period of time from another, or by describing longer processes of change - and continuity.
Within days we had the experience of abrupt and total disruption of our lives. This was History happening in front of and inside us!
Five days later New Zealand was under lockdown, alert level 4, meaning all but essential businesses were closed, the borders were closed, almost all internal travel came to a stop. Universities were closed and many students in the class left Wellington to return to homes elsewhere around the country, and across the world. The HIST 316 class in 2020 included five students on exchange from the United States. They travelled back to the US, but have continued to study and post to the blog.
Taking the course online meant changes to how we met, and the work we asked our students to undertake. An alternative assignment to the major research assignment initially set for the course, was devised. This alternative was for students to create a series of postings to a class blog: Living through History: Corona 2020.
As Course-Co-ordinator I began the blog as we went into lockdown. Students began posting to it as the university suspension period came to an end on 28 April.
The blog was created initially within Blackboard, the digital platform supporting teaching at the University. But the students’ work deserves a wider audience so we have brought it into this place to make it available to all.
The blog postings can be read by time, by author (follow the name tag), by theme.
Charlotte Macdonald, Professor of History, Te Herenga Waka Victoria University of Wellington
Related links
This project is part of continuing work on Digital Histories undertaken in History at VUW. You may also be interested in:
https://hist423digitalhistory2019.weebly.com/ and related projects by students in that class
http://lookingdownthebarrelofhistory.weebly.com/
http://www.soldiersofempire.nz/
http://www.imagining-arabia.co.nz/
https://www.slavevoyages.org/
https://hist423digitalhistory2019.weebly.com/ and related projects by students in that class
http://lookingdownthebarrelofhistory.weebly.com/
http://www.soldiersofempire.nz/
http://www.imagining-arabia.co.nz/
https://www.slavevoyages.org/
Acknowledgement
Development of this site has been assisted by Rebecca Lenihan (Research Fellow) and Maggie Blackburn (MA student, 2020).
Development of this site has been assisted by Rebecca Lenihan (Research Fellow) and Maggie Blackburn (MA student, 2020).