Assignment Topic: The Renaissance in

Europe

Md. Siam Hossain (2121436642)

Course Name: Introduction to World Civilization

Course Code: HIS102

Section: 13

Submitted to: Dr. Md. Faruk Shah (FKH)

Date: December 11, 2022

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 Abstract

The aim of this paper is to summarize the Renaissance in

Europe which took place from the 14th to the 17th century &
subsequently discuss how this great movement functioned as
the foundation of modern society or modernity. It focuses on
the spirits of Renaissance from various dynamics such as, the
patronage by the rise of Italian City States, focused on rational
individualism, recovering of the classic intellectual works of
Greek & Roman, awareness about the behavior of a person; a
brief discussion on the contributions of arts & literature
during the Renaissance; changing patterns of life including the
life of women, revolutionary emergence of the thought of
secularism & finally how the Renaissance ultimately created
the concept of modernity in all aspects of human civilization.

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 Table of Contents

1. Introduction 4

2. Spirits of the Renaissance 4

a. The Italian City States

b. Study of the Humanities

c. Recovering the Classics

d. Handbooks for Proper Behavior

3. Arts & Literature of the Renaissance 6

a. Renaissance Writers

b. Renaissance Paintings

c. Call for reform

4. Changing Patterns of Life 7

a. Daily Life

b. Life of Women in Renaissance

c. Revolutionary Political Thought

5. The Renaissance & Modernity 9

6. Conclusion 9

7. References 10

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Introduction

Renaissance is a French word which means “rebirth.”

This was a movement in Europe between the 14th & the 17th
century. It was basically a construction of society. In other
words, Renaissance brought the socio-economic & political
reforms in the society. Several factors were responsible for the
rise of Renaissance in Europe, which were political conflict,
aristocracy, capitalist economy, aspiration for democracy &
most importantly the rational individualism. The spirits of
Renaissance spread all around through many initiatives taken
in the society. This movement gained further popularity and
great achievements through the artistic and intellectual work
of Renaissance writers and artists. Renaissance greatly
influenced the normal daily life of people. Eventually, it was
the base of the new modern society(modernity).

Spirits of the Renaissance

The Italian City States
Many towns elaborated into city states in Italy. Each of
the city states was governed by itself & trade was so efficient.
This resulted the rise of new middle class. This newly rise
wealthy class in Italy became the patrons of the vast universe
of ideas & arts. Also, they become very curious about the vast
universe of ideas. This transition reflected by the increased
inquisitiveness about many aspects of knowledge. the
learning process & individual achievements.

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 Study of the Humanities
Rationality played the key role for the Renaissance in
Europe. Everyone realized the importance of Humanities.
Which included the study of history, poetry, eloquence,
grammar. This study of Humanities helped everyone to
understand the world of nature by using reasoning & logic
instead of the restricted paths of the Church.

Recovering the Classics

Intellectuals discovered many classical writings during
Renaissance. In this way they found out many hidden
components of knowledge. Francesco Petrarch, a
Renaissance writer, invented some Greek and Roman writings
such as the poetry of Virgil and Homer & wrote poetry about
love & life.

Handbooks for proper Behavior

People became more focused on the success of worldly
life rather than the afterlife. The concept of Courtier, adviser
to the King, emerged. Castiglione described this concept in
The Book of the Courtier. In The Prince, Machiavelli
recommended that in order to stay in the power rulers need to
apply a realistic course of action.

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Arts & Literature of Renaissance
Renaissance Writers
Literature was the main medium of Renaissance in
Europe. Like the traditional upper-class audience, the middle
class & the poor class raised as an audience of artistic works.
Niccolo Machiavelli, Francesco Petrarca, Leonardo da
Vinci, Baldassare Castiglione, Christopher Marlowe,
Michelangelo, Giovanni Boccaccio, Leonardo Bruni and
others were renowned & influential writers, poets & artists
during the Renaissance in Europe. Their works were
immensely followed by the new audience of poorer class.
People from all walks of life, irrespective of class, joined &
engaged themselves in the theaters, arts & literature inspired
by these famous Renaissance writers.

Renaissance Paintings
Painters of the Renaissance era hugely changed the use
of paints & the paintings. They added new dimensions to the
world of arts by their paintings. They also implemented
hidden messages for the human beings in their paintings. I
also observed some of these paintings during my study tour in
the National Museum of Bangladesh, initiated by my course
instructor. Which included The Last Supper & Monalisa of
Leonardo da Vinci. I also came to know about great
Renaissance artist Michelangelo there. In fact, Renaissance
artists tried to show the realistically, as it really existed

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through their paintings. Also, this paintings & works of
Renaissance artists are still a fact of mystery also.

Call for reform

In the early 1500s, some Christian scholars who had
made a study of the Bible and early Christian writings urged
reform of the Church to return to its early traditions based on
the teachings of Jesus. Everyone emphasized on religious and
worldly themes.

Changing Patterns of Life

Daily Life
Advances in technology gradually helped spread the new
learning to a wider audience. As a result, Renaissance
learning slowly filtered into the lives of ordinary people.
Johannes Gutenberg invented the moveable type printing
press. As printing methods improved, the cost of producing
books fell. People who could never have afforded hand-
copied books now bought printed books. The use of paper and
the development of printing had a revolutionary impact on the
world of learning. Ideas spread rapidly through the printed
word. The nuclear family gradually began to emerge,
especially in the towns and cities. In a nuclear family, only

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parents and their children live in a household. Some people
formed business partnerships with people outside the family.
When employers tried to keep wages low, the workers
revolted. The wages of city workers did rise during the
Renaissance.

Life of Women in Renaissance

Women started to work outside the home.
Some women were employed as servants in households of
wealthy farmers, merchants, or nobles. Many women also
earned money as spinners and weavers. Women in the
merchant class helped manage family businesses. Women ran
their own small businesses, selling handwork or garden
product at local markets. Women also played central roles in
governing city states or nations.

Revolutionary Political Thought

Rulers derived their power from God, However,
Machiavelli saw it as a natural entity; politics had nothing to
do with God’s intent. In secularizing and rationalizing
political philosophy, he initiated a trend of thought that we
recognize as distinctly modern.

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The Renaissance & Modernity
• Economy: commerce and industry expanded
greatly, and capitalism largely replaced medieval
forms of economic organization.
• Political: central government grew stronger at the
expense of feudalism.

• Social: middle-class towns people, increasing in

number and wealth, began to play a more important
role in economic and cultural life.

• Cultural: the clergy lost its monopoly over

learning.

• Theology: the queen of knowledge in the Middle

Ages, surrendered its crown to science, and reason.

Conclusion
After the dark ages this great movement Renaissance brings
positive & useful changes in European society. Which
eventually spread throughout the whole world & inspired
many more Renaissance. The role of the Renaissance in
Europe is immense behind our modern world as it is today, as
what we are.

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 References
The Prince: Study Guide. (n.d.). SparkNotes. https://www.sparknotes.com/philosophy/prince/

Buffalmano, L. (2022, August 9). The Book of The Courtier: Summary & Review. Power

DynamicsTM. https://thepowermoves.com/the-book-of-the-courtier-summary-review/

World History: Patterns of Civilization: Beers, Burton: 9780139681240: Amazon.com:

Books. (n.d.). https://www.amazon.com/World-History-Civilization-Burton-Beers/dp/

0139681248

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Executive summary

In a period of just few months, the COVID-19 pandemic caused

by a novel coronavirus has radically transformed the lives of
masses of people around the globe, including students. Indeed,
as of April 1, 2020, the number of learners required to stay at
home due to the closure of their educational institution at all
grade levels reached a peak of 1.598 billion from 194 countries
(UNESCO, 2020). Apart from the devastating health
consequences for those directly affected by the virus, the
COVID-19 pandemic holds major implications for the way
higher education students live and work, affecting their physical

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and mental well-being in profound ways. To capture the
immediate economic and social effects of the pandemic,
between May 5 and June 15, 2020 researchers from the
Faculty of Public Administration at the University of Ljubljana
(along with international partners) launched a large-scale online
survey across the world (31,000+ students from six continents,
100+ countries and 150+ institutions). Entitled Impact of the
Covid-19 Pandemic on Life of Higher Education Students, the
online questionnaire was based on and extended “The
European Students’ Union Survey (2020)” and asks higher
education students – what has student life looked like during
the COVID-19 pandemic, including teaching and learning,
social contacts, as well as how they are coping with the
situation emotionally in different parts of the world.
With this unique comprehensive global study, we tried to
provide systematic meaningful insights into students'
satisfaction and perception of different aspects of their lives
during the pandemic, including their opinions on the immediate
and distant future. We found that teaching stuff and universities
public relation offered students the most important support at the
university during the pandemic.. During the lockdown, students
primarily raised concerns about their future professional career
and study issue and were mainly bored ,anxious and frustrated.
They also changed some of their hygienic behaviours such as
regularly wearing masks and washing hands, and daily routine
habits like leaving home and shaking hands.
According to, the COVID-19 crisis corroborate the concerns of
international institutions like the United Nations, which stress
the importance of the efficient delivery of educational programs
in order to avoid digital, social, economic and gender
inequalities. Policymakers on all levels should invest in digital
literacy and infrastructure, while educational institutions should
provide flexible delivery methods, digital platforms and
modernized user-friendly curricula to both students of NSU and
teachers. All authorities involved in higher education systems
and the well-being of students, who constitute an extremely
important segment of the population, should prepare a set of

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proactive measures in the higher education arena so as to
ensure the proper support for students and their healthy
development in these ever-changing circumstances caused by
the pandemic.

Introduction
NSU is a site where students study in close quarters. They're also
humming cultural hotspots where students from all around the world
congregate. The fast spread of the coronavirus (Covid-19) outbreak
had undermined the foundations of this unique ecology, causing
uncertainty about the ramifications for higher education.

In response to the rising coronavirus outbreak, education officials

had been compelled to cancel courses and close campuses around
the world in recent weeks. In addition, NSU has converted to online
learning and urged students studying abroad in China, Italy, and
South Korea to come home to finish their studies.

While class cancellations, enrollment drops at the start of a new

semester, and class closures may be temporary, it's difficult to
predict if the novel coronavirus will cause long-term damage to
higher education.

Although it has some bad impact at the same time it plays some
good role in some cases.

Hypothesis
The topic is about the changes in the life of NSUer during the COVID
pandemic. Thoughts and views of these changes vary from person to
person. According to some people, this is good from one side. On the
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contrary, this pandemic did a great loss of student life. Both of them
and their thoughts are true from their perspective. Some students
made the best use of this pandemic and some misused their free time.
Some students gathered some extra skills whereas others wasted their
time by doing valueless things. We can’t deny anyone's thoughts.

If we go for the good changes there will be a lot of examples. Now,

most teachers and students are used to emails and online activities.
Once these things were kind of a burden. Now. there doing all kinds
of online things in a comfortable way. They were getting familiar
with many online judges. They were doing great with the help of
many outside lectures of lessons. Sometimes these things provide
many important things that can help one in his future need.

On the contrary, there is some misuse of time. Students got a huge

amount of time in this pandemic and got a less judgemental academic
situation. Where they waste their time gaming and chatting and many
more things. End of the day it created a gap in their studies. During
exams, they did copy from online and passed their level but ultimately
they did nothing throughout the whole semester. They didn’t carry a
sufficient amount of knowledge about their lesson. This one is a great
loss of a student.

This is the thing like this pandemic did some changes to student life
but not in the same way for all NSUer. Some benefited and some lost
their academic spirit.

Methodology

For this research paper, our team conducts primary and secondary
research to get better information on how students of NSU views the
impact of COVID-19 on their university life. At the time of primary
research, we conducted a survey that had ten questions that would

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provide us a clear understanding of how the university life of NSU
students changed due to COVID-19.

During our secondary research, all five members conducted online

interviews with friends from NSU. Each member interviewed two
people. In this way, we have done our interviews.

Interview
• How much have you missed your vivid NSU campus due to
COVID-19 ?

By interviewing the students, naturally, all of them started with

regrets for not being able to come to NSU campus because of
COVID-19. They mentioned that they missed this beautiful NSU
campus a lot. They also missed both attending the classes with their
friends and spending their free time with friends at the gallery or in
the study hall.

They further mentioned that this COVID-19 has deprived them of the
opportunity to explore themselves and meet with people in NSU's
new environment. Which they think has negatively affected their
creativity & communication skill.

The last thing they mentioned that, in this COVID-19 period the
campus life was totally vanished for them which is traditionally an
integral part of university life.

• Have you noticed any mental changes in yourself for not

being able to come to university for a long time due to
COVID-19?

According to five students, this COVID-19 specially campus closure

& online classes badly hampered their mental health. They think that
excessive use of various devices for online classes has made them
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irritable. They also mentioned that, online classes have made them
less attentive. They said, in the past they could easily understand a
topic and pay close attention to it. However, as a result of doing
regular online classes and relying too much on Google, now they are
not able to keep their attention on any topic for long.

But according to four students, they did not notice any mental
changes in themselves though they missed NSU campus a lot.

On the other hand, one student shared that, she suffered from mild
depression. Because she failed to make new friend circle after her
admission in NSU as she was not able to come to university due to
COVID-19. She added that it was complicated for her to make good
friends only through social media apps.

 Compared to coming to NSU and doing classes in the

classroom, what problems did you face in doing classes
online?

All the students think doing classes in traditional classroom is far

better than the online classes. In the beginning of COVID-19, they
were not familiar with the online educational platforms so it takes
time for them to become used to these platforms. Each of them also
mentioned that they faced network and internet issues while doing
online classes. Which hampered heir learning.

Everyone feels compared to the online classes it’s much easier in

offline classes to communicate with the faculty and solve the
problems regarding courses. Because, in online classes the face-to-
face interaction between students & the faculty are completely
missing. Which eventually sometime brings boredom to do the class.

Six students also stated that, it was much easier and time saving to do
classes in online compared to coming to NSU because of the bad
traffic situation in Dhaka.

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 • How stressful was it to complete various presentations,
assignments, group work and exams when the university
was closed?

Nine of the students found it very stressful to complete various

presentations, assignments, group work and exams through online. In
their opinion, the online exam questions were very hard than the usual
exams of offline. They also expressed their horrible experience
regarding the submission of answer paper in online. They think,
firstly, you have to answer all the questions, secondly, you have to
take pictures of that answer paper then lastly, you have to convert
those pictures into pdf for submitting. Which increases the mental
pressure at the highest level during online exams.

Only one student didn’t find it stressful at all. She thinks all the
assignments, presentation and online exams were easy because she
was regular to her studies.

 How would you assess your university life in the online

setup due to Covid-19 compared to the normal situation?

Of the ten students who took part in the interview process, four feels
that the online setup had pushed them back. Because of this online
setup, they have not been able to participate in various co-educational
activities, such as programming contest, club events and so on, which
are very important for their skill development.

Also, five students think that there are many students in the online
setup who have got a much better grade than expected in different
courses by adopting various bad tricks. Because of this, the students
who have worked really hard have been disappointed. In many cases,
hardworking students got worse grades than those who used bad
techniques in online exams.

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On the other hand, one student thinks that he enjoyed his university
life in the online setup because he is an introvert.

Data presentation and analysis

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Conclusion
COVID-19 pandemic has influenced all levels of the instruction
framework, especially in University education. Since March 26, 2020,
public holidays was pronounced by the Government of Bangladesh in
all educational institutions which hamper the students’ everyday
schedules and affect their both physical and mental wellbeing. This
study aims to explore the impact of COVID-19 among the university
students in Bangladesh by identifying their socio-demographic

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condition, changes in livelihood, and distinctly measuring the social,
economic, educational, technological, and psychological impact.

Universities and college campuses are places where students live and
study in close proximity to each other. They are also buzzing cultural
hubs where students are brought together from nations around the
world. Recently, the foundations of this unique ecosystem have been
impacted significantly by the rapid spread of the coronavirus (Covid-
19) outbreak, creating uncertainty regarding the implications for
higher education. In covid-19,, education officials have been forced
to cancel classes and close the doors to campuses across the world in
response to the growing coronavirus outbreak.North south university
students also faces lots of difficulties in this pandemic.From the
survey,we noticed that Covid-19 has increased the distance between
nsuers.

Covid-19 made made nsu students than earlier.COVID-19 demoted

nsu students communication skill.We also noticed that for the
pandemic it was difficult for the students to communicate with
teachers throughly.Students don’t event get chance to participate in
any extracurricular activity.
University students are increasingly recognized as a vulnerable
population, suffering from higher levels of anxiety, depression,
substance abuse, and disordered eating compared to the general
population. Therefore, when the nature of their educational
experience radically changes—such as sheltering in place during the
COVID-19 pandemic—the burden on the mental health of this
vulnerable population is amplified. The objectives of this study are to
1) identify the array of psychological impacts COVID-19 has on
students, 2) develop profiles to characterize students' anticipated
levels of psychological impact during the pandemic, and 3) evaluate
potential sociodemographic, lifestyle-related, and awareness of
people infected with COVID-19 risk factors that could make students
more likely to experience these impacts.

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Walking, moderate, vigorous, and total PA levels have been reduced
during the COVID-19 pandemic confinements in university students
of different countries. Despite of the reductions, those who met the
current minimum PA recommendations before, generally met the
recommendations also during the confinements.

Recommendation
Considering the alternative of no schooling, online schooling has
been an important tool to sustain skills development during school
closures. That being said, there are still concerns that online learning
may have been a sub-optimal substitute for face-to-face instruction,
especially so in the absence of universal access to infrastructure
(hardware and software) and lack of adequate preparation among
teachers and students for the unique demands that online teaching
learning pose. It will be great if NSU authorities teaches us online
developing skills. At same time, the role of teachers in supporting
students was definitely gonna helpful for students to become more
attentive to their studies. If they arrange many online competition, it
will help them to become more competitive.

Appendix
Survey Questions
Your honest answers are necessary for a good outcome of the
research.

Email address:
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1. Do you think covid19 increased the distance among the students
of NSU?
a. Yes
b. No

2. Covid 19 gave a huge amount of time due to lockdown, Does it

help NSUer to grow their skill, or did less judgmental online classes
made them dumb than earlier?
a. Made them skilled
b. Made them dumb than earlier

3. Did you feel as a NSUer covid 19 demoted your communication

skill?
a. Yes
b. No

4. What's the reason behind the beautiful result during a covid

lockdown? Did it help to study by giving much time or plagiarism?
a. Helped by giving much time
b. Plagiarism

5. How will you consider your communication with your classmates

only through social media during the online semesters?
a. Easier
b. Complicated
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6. Do you agree that due to COVID-19 online semesters have made
university life a lot easier compared to the past?
a. Agree
b. Disagree

7. Did the Covid 19 pandemic situation was helpful for your

extracurricular activities in university life?
a. Yes
b. No

8. Do you think Covid 19 made the students of NSU less

communicative with their teacher?

a. Yes
b. No

9. Were the LMS system (Canvas) by NSU, student-friendly during

the online semester because of COVID-19?

a. Yes
b. No

10. Did the Covid pandemic procrastinate your studies than in-person
class?
a. Yes
b. No

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Interview Questions

• How much have you missed your vivid NSU campus due to
COVID-19 ?

• Have you noticed any mental changes in yourself for not being
able to come to university for a long time due to COVID-19?

• Compared to coming to NSU and doing classes in the

classroom, what problems did you face in doing classes online?

• How stressful was it to complete various presentations,

assignments, group work and exams when the university was
closed?

• How would you assess your university life in the online setup
due to Covid-19 compared to the normal situation?

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