To study history is to guide your mind through the complex and beautiful narrative of humankind. History is everywhere. As historians, we focus on specific geographies, themes, cultures, or societies to try and understand what informed different peoples realities from across the world. How different peoples dealt with a range of challenges and innovations. But at the heart of the historian, at the foundation of the study of the humanities, is a love of the diversity of literature, art, culture, language, and of course, humanity. History is not simply dates and timelines, though those can be useful from time to time! In our world today the study of history is of immense importance. We should look to the events of the past and try to learn from them to make our world, our humanity, a more inclusive space for subsequent generations. 

Liam Salcuni studied late medieval/early modern European culture while in graduate school. His research interests are in the formations and perceptions of the human body through medicine, religion, and popular beliefs in and around the time of the bubonic plague that swept through Europe during the mid-fourteenth century. He is also an avid hiker, guitar player, and bass player.