Intro to Part 4 (pp.610-615) + Chapter 13 (pp. 617-649)

I learned that the eras we will be talking about is the ancient then classical and finally modern era. The main question that we should keep in mind this semester is if we are are still in the modern era. What it means to be modern is the technology we have available today and the rapidity of change. Chapter 13 is the political transformations of empires and encounters. We see European empires expanding to the Americas. The Spanish colonized the Caribbean, the Portuguese colonized Brazil, and the British, French, and Dutch all colonized North America. What gave the Europeans advantage in colonizing lands far away from home is that they had knowledge in air currents, innovation in mapping, navigation, and sailing technology. As many know about Hernan Cortes who was a Spanish conquistador who led the expedition to what is today Mexico and caused the fall of the Aztec Empire. Assisting Cortes in the fall of the Aztec Empire was Dona Marina, also known as La Malinche who was a interpreter, advisor, and loved Cortes. There would be a great dying epidemic because explorers and conquistadors from he New World brought diseases that would lead to around 60 to 80 million people dying. This was a social breakdown of Native Societies because their small villages were being depleted due to the quick loss of people from the diseases. Due to European colonization there was the beginning of the columbian exchange was was exchange of people, trade, disease, plants, and animals. The large scale transformations that the European Empires were generating around this time was the demographic collapse of Native societies. There was combinations of indigenous, European and African people meaning new societies were arising. With new plants and animals then there would be more crops and agriculture would improve. Silver mines became important in Mexico and Peru that were fueled by the trans Atlantic and trans Pacific commerce. This meant that there would be a need for workers and led to a mass scale of slavery. The cash crops that became very popular at this time was sugar and the cotton trade. From all this there was a rapid population because with more resources available then countries could maintain a large population. Who became most dominant around the world at this time were the Western Europeans. Although the Europeans benefited most by creating empires around the world they did not realize that there would be consequences on trying to maintain an empire across the ocean.

Chapter 23 Capitalism and Culture (pp.1137-1171) and Chapter 23 visual sources

As the chapter starts off, I learned about how there is a widespread availability of Barbie in Muslim Iran that has become a small example of power of global commerce in the world of the early twenty-first century. However other two other muslim dolls were created whose names are Sara and Dara, who are two Iranian Muslim dolls that counteract the negative influence of Barbie and Ken who had both dominated Iran's toy market. By creating both Sara and Dara this shows that there is not only resistance to the culture values that are associated with American products but also happens in the countries. Although there is a difference between Sara and Barbie there is also something in common which is that both were manufactured in China. We see a triangular relationship between United States, Iran, and China that symbolizes that growing integration of world economies and cultures and the conflicts that were generated by this process. There was an increase in dense web of political relationships, economic transactions, and cultural influences that occurred across the world's many peoples, countries, and regions that blinded them together more tightly and this all occurred during the twentieth century. Globalization was the process of accelerating engagement among distant peoples by the 1990s. Even though this term was new the process was not because globalization had occurred since far in the past. Places where globalization had once occurred was in the Arab, Mongol, Russian, Chinese, and Ottoman empires; also the Silk Road, Indian Ocean, and trans-Saharan trade routes; spread of Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam were all connections that had long linked the societies of the Eastern Hemisphere. With these connections there would be new rulers, regions, products, disease, and technologies to the people who lived in these empires. Through the Columbian exchange the Western Hemisphere and inner Africa would be permanently brought into a global network of communication, exchange, and often exploitation. The four major process that would accelerate global interaction after the impact from World War II were transformation of the world economy, emergence of global feminism, the confrontation of world religions with modernity, and the growing awareness of humankind's enormous impact on the environment. We have come to see that commonly today there is american acceptialism were everyone in the world should try to be like America with a democracy. Feminism has become a main topic today meaning that women are free to express gifts and talents in the world. Many people think that we are not going into a post-modern era but a Anthropocene Era which involves humans who have the capacities to change the evolution of the world itself. This era outlines the challenges that people in the future or my generation will have to deal with.

Chapter 21 Revolution, Socialism, and Global Conflict (pp. 1035-1068) + Ch 21 documents (pp. 1069-1085)

As I read about the The Rise and Fall of World Communism from 1917 to present; I learned that there was a growing disbelief in the ability of the communist regime to provide a decent life for the people and this would play as an important factor in the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. Earlier in this century communism had been welcome with open hands by countries like Russia, China, Cuba, and Vietnam, as a promise to the people of liberation from inequality, oppression, exploitation, and backwardness. This all sounded like a great life for the people and everyone quickly agreed that communism was the way to go towards achieving a better life. Due to the wake of war, revolution, or both communist regimes were able to quickly rise to power all throughout the world. After communist regimes were established then they would begin a thorough and revolutionary transformation of their societies by building socialism. Western world of capitalism and democracy feltht threat from the world communism that posed a strong military and political/idealogical power. Quickly there was separation and division between continents, countries, cities into communist and noncommunist halves. With the spread of communism there would be a rise of rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union (also known as USSR) for who would have greater influence in the southern part of the globe. Then came about and arms race for destructive nuclear weapons that would strike fear in all of the people around the world because schoolchildren would scramble under their desks during air raid drills, and sober scientist conjectured of possible extinction of human life or even all life if a major war were to break out. Then thankfully within the last two decades of the twentieth century there was the collapse of the communist regimes or also the abandonment of communist principles everywhere. The huge struggle between capitalism and communism, which was embodied by both United States and the Soviet Union, would all be resolved in a far more peaceful manner then anyone would have thought. As we read the Russian Revolution would bring to power the twentieth century's first communist government and would launch an intentional communist movement that embodied around one-third of the world's people around this time. Following the Russian Revolution would be a civil war through the Bolshevik eyes. The Bolshevik hoped to bring light of modernity and progress to a backward country, while depicting their opponent that they hoped to extinguish their light.

Chapter 22 Documents (pp. 1120-1135)

In documents I read about how visuals sources are important in representing independence. A great achievement of political independence from foreign domination marked a singular moment for millions of people in Africa and Asia for their personal and collective histories. This moment marked a new start of the people since they could build new lives and new societies. The struggle and and after the independence of these countries was expressed through poster art. These images expressed in poster art helped in inspiring and mobilizing large numbers of people for the tasks to move forward and look forward to a better future and to celebrate success at times. The African National Congress would lead a long march to freedom in South Africa that would finally be achieved in 1994. Even after Vietnam went through decades of opposition to French colonial rule and Japanese aggression, they still had a long struggle with American military intervention from the 1960s till the 1970s. This struggle was created from an effort of North Vietnam and the communist supports in the south that a worked together to reunify their country and also to drive out American military forces. This was going to be a difficult task to achieve since there were over a half million American military forces in Vietnam around the mid-1960s. North Vietnamese would succeed in driving out the American military forces by 1975. This was a surprising event not just the small Southeast Asian country that had accomplished a great feat but a surprising reversal for the American superpower who had lost control. The reasons for the America losing control over North Vietnam are still discussed but this occurring of events would be very significant for Vietnamese understandings of their national independence. From the drawing we learn that it is celebrating aspects of the unlikely achievement. Another major event during this time was the establishment of a independent state of Israel in 1948. This event would be seen as an enormous victory for Jewish people because of the return of Jewish people who had scattered and could now come back to the ancient biblical homeland from which many Jews had led or been expelled by various foreign rulers. The many foreign rulers that had expelled the Jewish from Israel were the Babylonian, Assyrian, Roman, Byzantine, and Crusader European. These change of events would lead to history being written for a new beginning and more change of events would occur in the future.

Chapter 22 The End of Empire (pp.1087-1119)

The End of the Empire was during the twentieth century which had an immense significance for the struggle for independence or decolonization. This became to be seen as a dramatic change for nation states were able to gain control to rule themselves finally after being controlled by empires that ran the world's political life in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The declining legitimacy of both empire and race as a credible basis for political or social life was signaled by decolonization. Decolonization helped not only bring national freedom but also personal dignity, abundance, and opportunity. Within these newly independent nations there would be changes in the political, economic, and cultural experiments, but also new challenges: changing the legacies of empire, the devision of language, ethnicity, religion, and class; the rapidly growing number in their population; and the competing demands of the capitalist West and communist East; tasks of building a more modern economy, stable politics, and coherent nations; then finally being able to compete with other nations that were already industrialized. European colonial empires in Africa and Asia at first appeared as permanent features of the world's political landscape in 1900. However this would quickly change by a breakthrough of countries in Asia and the Middle East in the late 1940s. These nations were the Philippines, India, Pakistan, Burma, Indonesia, Syria, Iraq, Jordan, and Israel who all achieved independence. There would be more than fifty colonies gaining independence in Africa from he mid-1950s through the mid-1970s which would lead to a change in history. At last South Africa would be able to put an end to the apartheid. This struggle in South Africa was not against a European colonial power, since they had gained their independence from Great Britain since 1910. Their independence was granted by a government that consisted of white settler minority, which was made up of less than 20 percent of the total population. While the black South Africans' struggled since they had no political rights whatsoever within the central state even though they made up a majority of the population. South Africa was able to develop a mature industrial economy by the early twentieth century that was first based off of gold and diamond mining, then included secondary industries such as steel, chemicals, automobile manufacturing, rubber processing, and heavy engineering. This comes to show that their economy did not rely upon one certain product and was very vast. Thanks to foreign investment and loans the economy benefited since the 1960s. The people working in the urban industries or mines, provided labor for white-owned farms consisted of black Africans who were all involved in the complex modern economy. This came to show that there was a very high dependence upon Africans for the white-controlled economy which left individuals highly vulnerable to repressive action, but the threat to withdraw their essential labor also gave them an advantage of using their weapon. Even though South Africa was able to gain its independence from the empire there was still much that the nation needed to change and improve. With time though there would be progress to move forward and change the way of life for the people for the better.

Chapter 14 Economic Transformations Commerce and Consequence 1450-1750

The Atlantic slave trade is a reminder of the enormous significance it had on commerce in human beings for the early modern world and its long last echoes that still are around in the twenty-first century. The slave trade was only one component of the international network of exchange that shaped human interactions between the time of 1450 and 1750. Europe quickly began growing prominence in long-distance exchange, they were not the only country that was a active trader. Other countries were Southeast Asians, Chines Indians, Armenians, Arabs, and Africans who played major roles in the making of a world economy during the early modern era. There was a rise in a commerce joined empire that became a global network during this time. With this economic transformation there would be a rise to new relationships, old patterns would come back and brought people who were once distant from one another together, enriched some, and impoverished or enslaved others. The wold world would be left behind, while a new on slowly emerged that came with much suffering and with growing inequalities. Many things would be gained but also lost in the transformation from the birth of a new global commerce. After Portugal began empire of commerce began to grow, Spain would challenge their position in increasing their empire throughout the world as well. Spain realized that they were behind in the race to gain access to the riches of East since Portuguese ships began to arrive in Europe with precious and profitable spices.. So Spain established themselves on what is known as today the Philippine Islands, named after the Spanish king Philip II. These islands were occupied by culturally diverse peoples and organized in small and highly competitive chiefdoms. This region was of little importance to countries like China and Japan who were the major powers in the area at the time. Since the Spanish saw that these spice islands, that were small and had militarily weak societies, the absence of competing claims, this encouraged the Spanish to establish colonial rule on the islands similar to the Portuguese style trading post empire. The Philippine Islands would remain as a Spanish colonial terrify until the end of the nineteenth century. With Spanish rule came a missionary effort, which turned Filipino societies into a major outpost of Christianity in Asia. Many features of Spanish colonial practice in the Americas found themselves happening in the Philippines as well. People that once lived in scattered settlements were either persuaded or forced to relocate themselves into Christian communities. People had to begin to deal with tribute, taxes, and unpaid labor which had not been part of their ordinary life before. The practices that were happening to the people in the Philippines was very unfair and Spain was the only country benefiting from their colonization, doing nothing in return for the people who lived there.

Chapter 15 Cultural Transformation Religion and Science (pp.740-752) + Document 15.2, Condorcet (pp.756-57)

The birth of modern science became a new way of thinking. Europe's Scientific Revolution was a vast intellectual and cultural transformation that took place between mid-sixteenth and eighteenth centuries. For the men during the scientific revolution they would knowledge through a combination of careful observation, controlled experiments, and the formulation of general laws, expressed in mathematical terms. The people who contributed to the Scientific Revolution were Copernicus from Poland, Galileo from Italy, Descartes from France, Newton from England, and others who saw themselves moving forward from older ways of thinking. It was time to leave the old ways behind and lay a new Foundation of a more magnificent Philosophy. Science became so widespread by the twentieth century that it lost its association with European culture and became the main symbol of global modernity. Modern science was able to become a universal worldview like the main religions Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam; modern science was open to all who accepted its premises and its techniques. Science in the Nineteenth century changed for perspectives from the Enlightenment were not only being challenged by romanticism and religious enthusiasm but by a new development of European science. Modern science began to be applied to new domains of human inquiry in was that would undermine the assumptions of the Enlightenment. Charles Darwin was one of many people who challenged assumptions of the Enlightenment arguing that life has always been in constant change, and over millions of years new species of plants and animals have appeared while others went into extinction. This is is the same for humans, for they too were the work of evolution operating through natural selection. Karl Marx was another important figure at the time, articulating his view of human history that emphasized change and struggle. The change was a successful historical transformation in social classes that went from slave owners and slaves, nobles and peasants, and finally capitalists and workers. Marx saw himself as a scientist, basing his theories on extensive historical research that was similar to both Newton and Darwin. Marx aimed to formulate general laws that would help explain events in a rational way. Darwin and Marx believed strongly in a society that would progress through conflict and struggle, that was far more efficient then reason and education for progressing forward. The Enlightenment way of thinking which was through thought, rational, and independent individual was fading away. This cultural transformation would spread through all of Europe and lead to a more advanced society.

Chapter 20 Collapse at the Center World War, Depression, and the Rebalancing of Global Power 1914-1970s + Chapter 20 Documents (pp. 1018-1033)

As we all know from 1914-1918 was the First World War or World War I which was a whole new phase of world history that occurred. This European civil war would provoke the Russian Revolution and would lead to the beginnings of world communism. Following World War I we would see an meltdown in the economy due to the Great Depression, then the rise of Nazi Germany that would lead to the Holocaust that demonstrated pure horror, and then an even more deadly World War II. Within a short period of only three decades Europe which was once seen as the dominating center of the modern world system will have self-destructed or fallen apart. Many could say that Europe had damaged itself beyond self repair, all while the United States and the Soviet Union rose to bring about a shift from being minor countries to becoming global powers. Even after devastation of war, Europe was able to recover slowly but surely in the second half of the century thanks to its restoration of its industrial economy, and would finally put aside their differences of a war prone nationalist passion in a loss European Union. After all these events unfolding in Europe, after 1945 Europe would lose its control as the political, economic, and military core of Western civilization marking a new start in history. This meant that United stakes was now in charge of making a change in the historical development of the West. The country that was once restrained by chains, now could move freely and walk a path free of options. The Great War or also known as the First World War was a event that changed everyone. No one expected the war to go on for more then the late summer of 1914, many expecting their son home by Christmas; however, this was not the case for it would end after a little more then four years with German defeat in November of 1918. The casualties were far larger then anyone expected due to trench warfare where each side was fighting restlessly to gain or lose only a few years of muddy, blood-soaked ground. These battles did not last only a few days or weeks but would carry on for months in places like Verdun and the Somme in France. What made World War I more perfidious is that the countries that became involved ended up in total war where the entire country was mobilizing for war. The aftermath of this war would bering about change that was both social and cultural for the ordinary Europeans and Americans. This war changed not only the way of living but the entire way of history. Horror struck many of how many casualties there were in the war and many hoped that this would never happen again.
From the documents I looked at the propaganda and critique in World War I. War is something that artist would create, the meaning of the drawing would be to portray the enemy in the most terrible way. Posters and drawings were created to generate public support for the struggle of what was going on. However for independent artist, they would draw something different which was the face of the hostilities and their aftermath from the war. The illustrations shown in the visual sources illustrate both perspectives on the First World War. The visual source that stood out most to me was The Battlefield on page 1030 which demonstrates maimed, and disfigured veterans,, man of them had men without faces. The men in the drawings were a reminder of a terrible past that many wanted to forget. Trench warfare was where most of the fighting occurred and in the drawing we see men go over the top only able to gain a few yards of bloody ground before being thrown back with a high number of casualties. John Nash free the picture and was an official war artist. Nash was one of eight-man of a British unit that had to go over the top in late 1917 and was one of twelve survivors from that attack. As a reminder of what he had gone through he painted this picture three months later. This comes to show that many people are never able to forget what they went to and are able to share their memories through stories, poems, and drawings.