Section Four - The Modern World

Chapter 13 One of the first things that struck me in reading Chapter 13, was the fact that many of the peoples that were part of the Aztec Empire assisted Cortes in his destruction of the empire. It strikes me because no matter where you look in history you see these same behaviors, which never end well for those helping the incoming conquerors. I was also surprised to read that many of the Aztecs settled down willingly with the Spanish. I have never seen the history presented in this manner. It was additionally interesting to read about how differently the British Colonies evolved as opposed to the Spanish and Portuguese colonies in the Americas. The plague of European illnesses wiping out so much of the native american populations was huge. And the distinct differences between the ethnic mixing in the Southern American Continent vs. no mixing in the North American Continent between conquerors and indigenous peoples. I thought it interesting that Russia grew it's empire by simply annexing and incorporating other regions and peoples into their territories rather than going on conquest. I'd always understood that Church was a huge part of the Russian Empire pre - communism, but the reading leads me to a different conclusion. Not that Christendom did not pay a large role in the creation and maintenance of the empire, but that is was not a driver for the creation of the empire. I found reading about the Mughal Empire much more fascinating than reading about Chinese Expansionism and Empire building. It was very interesting to read how the Mughals went from one extreme (highly Cosmopolitan in their rule) to the other, strictly enforcing Sharia Law and trying to get the entire continent to convert. I had previously not understood how Briton was able to take over such a vast country. The Ottoman Empires big surprise for me was the incursion as far as Vienna of this I was not aware. Islamic state building then was very cosmopolitan and allowed peoples to retain much of who they were including their Christianity. I very much appreciated the way the chapter tied everything together, with all of the foods that were now spread around the world due to colonization of the Americas as well as the impacts globally to the various peoples that were affected by all of this. I was very interested to see the different way to look at European expansionism vs Chinese and Islamic (Ottoman) expansionism and how even today we are all impacted by those results. Chapter 14 Early in Chapter 14 we learn that Europe really had nothing of value for trade purposes with the East. It was the discovery and colonization of the Americas that truly allowed Europe to step on to the World Stage and become a dominant power. I was very surprised to read about the importance of Silver during this time. We don't think of it being the biggest commodity needed for the Asian trade market in todays terms, so this was a bit of a surprise to read about. And that much of it was filtered from the Americas through the Philippine Islands. I was also very interested to read the differences between Japan's use of silver and Spain's use of it. The Japanese were very smart in their use of Silver and their 18th and 19th century societies appear to have the hallmarks of where we are attempting to get today in the world, marrying later, having children later, protecting the environment. I was very surprised to learn the origins of the tie in between racism and slavery, and the different theories that historians have around how Slaver become so strongly associated with African Slavery. Chapter 15 What I got most out of Chapter 15 is the impact of cultural borrowing. Something that I believe we still do today.