Are you dead yet? - Help me kill students!

[lollardfish]

When I go interview at Willamette, I need to teach a 1 hour class. I'm going to do it on the Black Death, but first I want to play a game with the students. I call it, "If you were alive back then, would you be dead!" Better title suggestions gladly accepted.

I ask all the students to stand up, then I ask them questions about their lives, and tell them if they are dead or alive had they lived in the Middle Ages and make them sit down. This time it'll be for 1300, when actually nascent medical developments had improved certain things, like midwifery, to some extent. I try to end up with a few women and a few men left at the end, so I can kill some of the women in childbirth and some of the men in battle, and then tell the remaining ones that they could live to be 90!

It's unscientific. It's not based in hard medieval population data. It's an icebreaker. I need more questions though, and so I turn to you.

I ask:

1 - Who had a very serious childhood illness, so serious you've been told about it by your folks? Mumps, measles, bad chickenpox, etc. I kill about 25% off, but not too many. A nice chunk of people though.
2 - Who has broken a leg or an arm? I kill a few off from infection.
3 - Who has had appendicitis? I kill myself off (age 12! Oh, the humanity!)
4 - Who's been in a serious accident (car, bike, whatever)?
5 - Who has had a bad case of the flu lately?

I'd like a few more questions. Any advice?

Comments

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

Is "Who was born prematurely" too intrusive?

[chirosinger.livejournal.com]

Type 1 diabetes (childhood onset) would kill off quite a few folks. A deep cut or puncture wound will kill off a few folks (infection/tetnus). Pneumonia would get a bunch.

[creidylad.livejournal.com]

Also, any childhood bacterial infection could have become meningitis.

Mostly controllable now:

[lsanderson.livejournal.com]

Asthma,
Diabetes,
Dysentery,
Pneumonia,
Food-poisoning,
Food allergies
Insect allergies

[kalikanzara.livejournal.com]

I was going to post in faver of inheritable traits/birth defects, such as pyloric stenosis, but that is probably covered under illness.

I'm guessing you could kill some percentage of people who'd had major dental work.

Some percentage of those who have glasses or contacts may be more prone to accidental death due to vision impairments, maybe? That's probably a stretch.

Would there be any reasons for infanticide in 1300? I think that's probably too late for the practice.

I'm not sure exactly when the witch hunting craze caught on, but there are documented trials in the 1300s. You could just ask if anyone had ever been accused of having the evil eye.

Pregnancy complications and childbirth should kill a slice, and w/o birth control I figure that would mean there would have been more pregnancies.

You could get creative with travel hazards and just kill 10% of anyone who had travelled more than 500 miles to get to the college.

[jmanna.livejournal.com]

What about something like SIDS. Pick a random fourth of the class and tell them they didn't survive the first year for unknown reasons.

WHEEL! OF! DEATH!

[jbru.livejournal.com]

You could kill a percentage who self-identify as religious on the theory they'd be sent crusading or on pilgrimage.

A percentage who have done manual labor due to accidents.

A chunk that went to the bathroom before class because they got cholera or dysentary.

I'd kill 25% off right off the bat because they were probably all immunized agasin't childhood diseases.

Sounds fun!

[jmanna.livejournal.com]

You could declare a few wealthier and kill them from lead poisoning or syphalis(sp) (rampant in the nobility of many european/English courts though that might have been later).

[rani23.livejournal.com]

Here's a somewhat tricky one -- any of them mothers or have ever had sex? Birth control wasn't terribly good and many women died in childbirth.

[chirosinger.livejournal.com]

And all of this to get your new stuffed toy? What a great scheme!

[jadiana.livejournal.com]

There might be some ideas here:

http://www.hyw.com/Books/History/Health.htm

[jadiana.livejournal.com]

*shrugs* I was just trying to help.

[sleigh.livejournal.com]

Anyone born by C-section? (Both my kids were...)

You might consider bringing in some dice (especially since it's likely several of your students have been RPG gamers) and for those people who have had a serious chidlhood illness, assign them a certain roll they need to make to survive (for instance, if you only have the common 6-sided die, give 'em a 1 or 2 in 6 chance of dying...)

[sidhebear.livejournal.com]

How about wiping out a percentage of the people who have "had food poisoning more than twice in your life" or "had food poisoning in the last three years" to simulate the "vermin" effect.

[mizzlaurajean.livejournal.com]

Starvation kills.

[mizzlaurajean.livejournal.com]

It would probably kill too many but it's likely most of them weren't breast feed long enough to give them a chance in hell of surviving till the age of 2.

[zinzinzinnia.livejournal.com]

Everyone took mine. :(

Sibling rivalry? ;)

[madtruk.livejournal.com]

Bathing daily-

Anyone waking up and rushing to class may have splashed water and run, not removing the layers of dust mites, bed bugs, and assorted decay from their bodies-also; ticks, fleas and all the other yum-yums that feast on the body carrying, oddly enough, the Black Death.

[hunnythistle.livejournal.com]

What about students who had chronic ear and throat infections as a child, and anyone who has had their tonsils out?

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

That's a good choice.

B