BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//132.216.98.100//NONSGML kigkonsult.se iCalcreator 2.20.4// BEGIN:VEVENT UID:20250812T175838EDT-4072FEmKoM@132.216.98.100 DTSTAMP:20250812T215838Z DESCRIPTION:This talk by Jason Opal is part of our Fall 2019 Policy Lecture series. These academic talks are intended for 51Թstudents and faculty .\n\nIn the 1500s and 1600s\, smallpox replaced plague as the most deadly and terrifying disease in the world. The usual story of how humanity overc ame 'spotted death' focuses on Edward Jenner's idea of vaccination in the late 1790s\, but the process of mass inoculation--the forerunner to vaccin ation--began instead on the slave islands of the eastern Caribbean\, where masters had total control over West African bodies\, value\, and medical knowledge.\n\nRegister Here\n\nAbout Jason Opal\n\nJason M. Opal studies c olonial North America\, the American Revolution\, and the early decades of the United States. His work tries to integrate social\, cultural\, and in tellectual history and to shed light on such broad topics as nationalism\, capitalism\, and democracy.\n\nOpal did his undergraduate work at Cornell and his doctoral studies at Brandeis\, where he worked with historians su ch as Jane Kamensky\, David Hackett Fischer\, and James T. Kloppenberg. Hi s first major project was on the cultural transformation of ambition in th e post-Revolutionary New England countryside. It resulted in a 2004 Journa l of American History article that won the Organization of American Histor ians’ Binkley-Stephenson Award and in the 2008 book\, Beyond the Farm: Nat ional Ambitions in Rural New England\, published by the University of Penn sylvania Press. His second project focused on the southern borderlands of the American Revolution and the rise of Andrew Jackson as the leader of an American national concept joining modern property regimes and epic religi ous narratives. Supported by a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Cou ncil grant\, this research culminated in the 2017 book\, Avenging the Peop le: Andrew Jackson\, the Rule of Law\, and the American Nation by Oxford U niversity Press. This book was chosen by the History Book Club and the Mil itary History Book Club in the United States and selected as one the “best summer books” in history and law by The Times of London. His recent writi ngs have also appeared in The Washington Post\, The Los Angeles Times\, Sa lon\, The Walrus\, The Conversation\, and Jacobin.\n\nHis new projects are Most Noble Island: Three Ages of Barbados in the Early Americas and a col laborative project with his father\, Dr. Steven M. Opal\, on the history o f epidemic diseases in American life.\n\nAt McGill\, Opal teaches surveys of the early United States and the American Revolution as well as more spe cialized courses on the history of slavery\, U.S. foreign relations\, demo cracy\, and the family.\n\n \n DTSTART:20191121T210000Z DTEND:20191121T223000Z LOCATION:6th Floor\, CA\, QC\, Montreal\, H3A 0B8\, Sherbrooke 680\, 680 Sh erbrooke St W SUMMARY:The Public Policy of Slave-owners: Smallpox Inoculation in the Brit ish Caribbean\, 1700s-1740s URL:/maxbellschool/channels/event/public-policy-slave- owners-smallpox-inoculation-british-caribbean-1700s-1740s-300515 END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR