Jose Alvarez Avina

A. Paleolithic Persistence: Australia and North America    1. Gatherers and hunters have a history, too    2. Manipulation of the environment and trade    3. “Complex” or “affluent” gatherers and hunters B. Agricultural Village Societies: The Igbo and the Iroquois    1. Egalitarian kinship societies without state systems    2. “The Igbo have no king” but they did trade    3. Great Law of Peace of th e Five Nations C. Pastoral Peoples: Central Asia and West Africa    1. Timur/Tamerlame (d. 1405)    2. Samarkand    3. Fulbe II. Civilizations of the Fifteenth Century: Comparing China and Europe   A. Ming Dynasty China      1. Emperor Yongle (r. 1402–1422)      2.Confucianism and anti-Mongol policies      3. Economic boom      4. Zheng He’s voyages (1405–1433)  B. European Compari...

largest land-based state in history great engineers and extremely good learners who changed the world more than any other super power they could run over the brutally cold lands of Siberia and the brutally hot lands of Arabia A lot of tech ( dissipation of gun powder, paper, and printing press) happened as a direct result of their conquests Helped shape the world we live in today they were extremely innovative and played on key weaknesses of their opponents  built a spectacular international postal system through a big chunk of Eurasia created standardized bank notes and paper currencies long before Europe Free trade are that connected most of the world built religious tolerance that spanned all religions they knew sciences, astronomy, engineering, and math exploded in mongol era constant thirst for knowledge & quick learners  spread whatever they learned from various cultures .5 men related to GK in the world very effective military  infrastructure f...

This read on China actually really interested me. This was like a golden age of Chinese achievement. They developed a vast canal system that linked northern and southern china. We also see the creating of the examination system, and with that with we see the process of electing officials based on merit and not bas on privilege. With the emergence of cities we also saw specialized markets, performers, restaurants, and inns. There was also a lot of technological advancement like printing, gun powder, and shipping technologies. They also had books on topics like agricultural, mathematics, and medical topics. For women in the Song dynasty it was a weird time with the rebirth of confucius ideas they were back to the way of thinking that women were less than men and that basically their only job was to stay home and tend to the needs of the household. Women were seen as a distraction and were not allowed in the work place. There was also things like foot binding that was cruel. But they also...

The beginning of this chapter was really interesting because learning about Hassan and how he was Christian and Muslim that was very interesting to me, I had no idea you could do that. One of the most interesting things about his chapter was how the religion was started. It not only was the religion it was an empire at the same time. Unlike other religions they had the man power to go to war with other regions. They grew simultaneously as a religion and as an empire. It was the largest and most influential third wave civilization. Islamic civilization challenged and provoked Christendom, transformed by African cultures, and took root in India, Central Asia, and Southeast Asia. The spread continued to the modern era by 2013 1.6 billion people followed it which was 23% of the population. Now if that doesn't tell you something I do not know what will.. Another thing that was intriguing was how it changed how the people lived. they went rom being nomadic Arabs (Bedouins)  to a settle...

This chapter was really interesting to me because it was really cool to read about all the trade. The most fascinating thing to me was seeing how each terrain produced something different. Each terrain really took advantage of the resources that were available to them. Trade was very important because different regions could have access to things that they usually wouldn't. It also had a huge impact on the regions economic systems, and it started things like taxes. In china Silk was like gold and it was usually made in homes by women. People who usually grew food gave that up and started producing paper, porcelain, and iron tools. This really created an opportunity for people that might have never been able to change the way they lived. It made some people very rich.  Africa had gold, iron goods, and slaves. Arabia: myth, and perfumes. India had grain, ivory, and cotton, stones, spices. China had silk, porcelain, and tea.All of these roads linked the world and change...

In this chapter we saw the similarities and differences between Eurasia, Africa, and the Americas. One of craziest things to me is the way the population was distributed, 85% of the population was in Eurasia. I think the number one thing this can be attributed to is agriculture. In the americas there weren't as lucky as they were in Eurasia. They did not have animals they could domesticate, they also had not developed any written language. Because of this the Americas and Africa had civilizations that were a lot smaller. Another major difference is that the Americas were isolated so they didn't really have anyone to communicate with like the people of Eurasia and Africa. Although the people of the Americas did not have access to iron tools or animals for domestication they still eventually achieved great things. We see with the Mayans were able to have a political system, engineering, mathematics, and even a writing system. The people of Teotihuacan formed Americas largest urba...

In this reading we saw how the 2nd wave civilizations changed their social systems. With the agriculture booms and people starting to make more than others. Also with forms of government starting to rise of course there is going to be divisions between all of the people. In India there was a very interesting structure. Basically there was a caste system with five levels priests, warriors, merchants, peasants, and the untouchables. A normal person would think that yeah if you happened to be born into a peasant family that is unfortunate but with hard work you might one day be able to become a merchant. However that was not the case whatever you were born into you were for the rest of your life. The only way to move up was to die that way and basically if you were a peasant you had to be a great peasant your whole life. To me this seems outrageous but to the people of the time they really believed it and they followed through with it. I could not live in a society like this. If you wer...

This reading was really interesting to me because it was interesting to learn about the people who really started to challenge the way everyone else taught. Not only that but to also learn about other religions. If you think about it they were the first ones to come up with these ideas, to other people at first they probably thought they were crazy. But they all kind of shared a vision of putting order into their societies. Confucianism was an interesting to learn about because he was concerned with social relationships, and he was concerned with order and place. I understood his way of things and how everyone had to put their part in for everything to work smoothly. But it was sexist to women because with his ideas theres no way a girl would be allowed to work. Women were just expected to stay at home to cook and clean and basically just make sure everything was set for her husband. The husband was the one that was responsible for making the money. He believed that women were inferio...

On Tuesday October 10th I went on a truly eye opening experience. It felt great just to be able to give back to the community and spend time with the 5th graders. I had forgotten what it really felt like to help others out. Im so glad it was with these kids too, because I feel like I can relate to when I was in elementary school. I hope we gave them good examples to look up to and gave them hope and motivation. It made me want to work harder and set a better example not just for these kids but for all of the little ones that are in my family that look up to me. One of my favorite moments was at the end when we had to say goodbye to the kids. Alonso gave me and my partners like four hugs and he said he did not want to leave us. I feel we really had an impact on him. The teacher also came up to us and thanked us because she said that he did not really get a long well with others. After I learned that it made me really happy and it made the whole trip a thousand times better. I really ho...

The document that I found most interesting was the one of the Persians. First of all looking at their religious beliefs, the did believe in gods but they still believed that no one had power like humans. So no matter how powerful a god was he was never going to have as much power as a human could. They also didn't believe in building altars or shrines, and did do sacrifices but not to the same extent as other people. Persians also really only celebrated one thing and that was their birthday. The wealthy would serve all types of animals, the poor would usually only serve cattle but they would still serve plenty of food. One thing that Persians did was enjoy luxuries and they were quick to adapt. If they saw a technology from another region they would quickly adapt and buy whatever the new thing was. The main thing that they focused on was manliness and mostly on the battle field. When a man had a son he wouldn't meet him until he was 5 so he would not get emotionally attached if...

In this reading I really got to see how different all of the civilizations were. Starting out with the Persian empire we saw a gigantic empire that had millions in it population. We saw how to conquered a lot of land. What was really surprising however was how they were really nice towards the people they took over, they would still let them practice their religions. One thing about them was they had one leader and that leader got the upmost respect and power. He was feared so he could do anything. Next we saw the Greek empire which was very different from the Persian empire. First it was different in size, the Greek empire was only 5 or 6 million. Another major thing was the government, instead of having on ruler the Greek empire operated in smaller but more city states. What was crazy was when these two clashed and the Greek empires being the underdog was able to defeat the Persians. Now we couldn't talk about civilizations without talking about the Roman Empire. Which really wen...

The way the elite could have taken advantage of the seals is to regulate merchandise, or to keep track of what merchandise was there whenever they had to move it. The seal could have also acted as a signature, maybe if the seal had something unique on it that only the owners seal had. They could have also used it for like branding. I also think the seals were used to distinguish people. I don't think you would see an official or landowner with the same seal as a worker. So in a way these could have seen as a sign of power. You could think of it as a police badge, it just gave people authority. One thing that the writing pointed out is that even if you didn't speak a language you would still be able to understand a seal because it was just a picture. So they were very versatile.

Again like I said in my last post it is crazy how much the early people advanced. They went from being gatherers and hunters and not having any food stability to growing their own food and domesticating animals to have a more stable food source. They also went from being nomadic to staying in a single place. The more time they stayed in a single place the better technologies they developed. With civilizations we see a rise in democracies in some of the first 7. They were getting so big they had to rely on someone to lead them and govern them. Not only that but also to think of ideas for them especially for stuff like irrigation. One of the most important things though is the development of written language. With this they could advance their ideas even further and advance their technologies.

I liked seeing both the pros and cons of people going from gatherers and hunters to growing crops and having cattle and livestock. Some of the pros were that they were able to sustain a lot more people so the population increased dramatically. They didn't have to constantly move around so it gave them more time which led them to develop a lot more technologies. But some cons were that they still relied on nature for rain and soil conditions so there would still be times where the food would be scarce. Living next to animals put them more vulnerable of getting diseases. Agriculture was also a lot more harsh on their bodies because it required a lot more physical labor. It was also interesting to see the more time they settled the closer and closer they got to forming democracies.

One of the most interesting things to me that we had also talked about in class is how the first part of human history the Paleolithic and Neolithic eras make up 95% of all human history, However it isn't talked about or written about like the stuff that is more recent. The further we get into history the more information there is and of course that is because writing became more and more prominent. Another interesting thing is seeing how the first civilizations moved from Africa to at one point finally inhabiting every part of the world. Also seeing how they moved from hunting and gathering to farming and then eventually making civilizations.