The topic of this course project is “comparison of society during the early Renaissance in Europe to contemporary society.” This topic was chosen because of the strong belief that the reflections about the past and continuous paralleling of the previous experiences with the modern ones are the way to a deeper understanding of today’s world foundation. From medieval times, European society has changed its mindset in multiple spheres many times up until now, but the current project will focus on the difference in views on money, wealth, and power. This intricate subject seems to dominate the modern world obsessed with material values. If society’s goals are found to be similar, then the roots of these desires need to be uncovered and examined. If different, then, perhaps, there is something to learn from our ancestors. The project goal is to understand what has and what has not changed in the modern people’s perception of money, wealth, and power as compared to the early Renaissance European society.
Literature Review
There has been some research in this particular area, however, with little comparison to modern times. The works are mostly written for purely historic review and in-depth source analysis. Richard Goldthwaite (2015), for example, delves into the study of financial records and family documents of wealthy families of Florence to ascertain the daily lifestyle of the Renaissance society. The limitation of this study relating to the current project might be that the authors’ observations are mostly broad and uncertain. However, the book can be useful as it presents fragments of original documents used in the study.
Gene Brucker (2015) shed some light on the European Renaissance society in the context of civic interconnections and stratification. His work is of particular interest to the current project as it contains valuable information on society’s inner organization and politics. The limitation of this book may be in the lack of attention towards common people’s position.
John Martin (2016) focused his study on the personality of a Renaissance person and his or her realization of self as an individual. The key aspect of his work that can be helpful to this study is a detailed analysis and speculation of a professional historian on how the mind of a medieval person worked. He supports his thoughts with evidence from contemporary documents and literature.
Methodology
The primary method of collecting data about the perception of concepts of money wealth and power in the early Renaissance society would be literature analysis. The choice of works will be based on the presence of information about the medieval people’s perception of the said notions, data on their daily life, or general society organization. The objective here would be to crystallize the significance of these concepts. To gather the data on modern perception of the mentioned concepts a series of short interviews might be needed. The data on modern and Renaissance concepts’ perception will be then compared.
Work Plan
The project is planned in three stages: data collection from literature sources on the early Renaissance, short interviews with modern people on the topic of money, wealth, and power, analysis and comparison of the data.
Results and Implications
The desired results will include similarities and differences in perception of money, wealth, and power. This project could help better understand the transformation of the concepts’ meaning and the extent of their influence on modern people’s lives. Perhaps, it would give an insight into the direction of the development of modern society.
References
Brucker, G. A. (2015). The civic world of early Renaissance Florence. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Goldthwaite, R. A. (2015). Private wealth in Renaissance Florence. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Martin, J. (2016). Myths of Renaissance individualism. New York, NY: Springer.