Final blog - NDNU History cass - Summer 2011

I wanted to start this blog off, by saying that I have really enjoyed this class. Although it seemed tough at times to meet the deadlines for the assignments and read all the chapters – which by the way I am grateful we got a break on – it was a very enjoyable class to be a part of. I have learned an immense amount being in the class. I enjoyed the teaching style as well, and really appreciate the many exercises that Patti did in class to ensure that we learned what we needed to learn to be successful, not only in the class but in our knowledge of important historical events that took place in the past centuries. Although I feel I have a lot more to learn, this class really did set a foundation for me in understanding the history of the world.

II have said it before and I will say again, that many people have perhaps criticized Strayer’s way of writing, I would say that he seems to have  been a little more repetitive than he maybe needed to be at some points in the chapters. Even though he could have been less repetitive, I would say that it has helped me to retain a lot of the information that was taught in the chapters. Strayer did a good job of having a balance between, sharing the facts and his opinions. It makes it very difficult when you are trying to learn something and it is all coming from one point of view. He seemed to lay out the facts based on his viewpoint and back them up with information that he thought was pertinent to the events.

I did also enjoy his somewhat poetic style of writing, this is mostly what I think helped me to stay engaged and enjoying the chapters.

Some of the points that stood out to me and where I felt he was writing with a poetic style in a couple of the sections in Chapter 23, were the following:

§         “In 1900, European colonial empires in Africa and Asia appeared as permanent features o the world’s political landscape.” (Page 692)

§         In 1940’s India, Pakistan, Burma, Indonesia, Iraq, Jordan and Israel were among the first to break free of the colonial rule and structure of those who governed them during this time.

§         “Never before had the end of empire been so associated with the mobilization of the masses around a nationalist ideology; nor has these earlier cases generated a plethora of nation-states, each claiming a place in the world of nation-states.”

§         These decolonization, were comparable to European colonies in the Americas threw off the British, French, Spanish.

§         “The 20^th century witnessed the demise of many empires.” (Page 693)

§         “WWII ended the Japanese and German empires.”

§         “Empires without territory, such as the United-States, in Latin America, came under attack from highly nationalist governments.”

§         “As the twentieth century closed, the end of the European empires seemed an almost “natural” phenomenon, for colonial rule has lost any credibility as a form of political order.”

§         “Explaining the end of colonial empires focuses attention on fundamental contradictions in the entire colonial enterprise that arguably rendered its demise more or less inevitable. The rhetoric of both Christianity and material progress sat awkwardly with the realities of colonial racism, exploitation and poverty.” (Page 694)

§         “At the same time, social and economic circumstances within the colonies themselves generated the human raw material for anticolonial movement.” (Page 695)

§         “Veterans of the world wars; young people with some education but no jobs commensurate with their expectations; a small class of urban workers who were increasingly aware of their exploitation….all of these groups had reason to be believe that independence held great promise.”

§         “These reforms and, ultimately, independence itself occurred only under considerable pressure from mounting nationalist movements.”

§         “The most prominent among them became the “fathers” of their new countries as independence dawned.” (Page 695-696)

As I read the final few chapters that were assigned I found myself very interested in the process of India and South Africa becoming independent and in some of the differences between the two, and in the two major leaders of both countries.

It is so amazing to me how one person can make an impact in such ways that can change the course of the current times and essentially changing the course of history itself. People like Jesus, Buddha, Confucius, Socrates, Mohammad, Christopher Columbus, Martin Luther, Adolf Hitler, Mahatma Ghandi, Nelson Mandela, and many more, over time have had such an impact in their communities and really throughout the world. Even though not all of these individuals made an impact for the better or the good of the people and the world, I have a respect for them for stepping out into the unknown world and doing whatever it was that they wanted to do to make their mark on the world.

The unfortunate thing for me with the so-called world leaders, is that many of them – Hitler especially in my opinion – may have used their power for the greed and evil of the world. I always wonder about Hitler type people who have such a massive impact on the world, what would have happened if they had done good with the power that they so readily thought was theirs. And then there are people like Nelson Mandela, who’s goal was to bring people into a state of equality and peace. It was nice to read that there was a decolonization and movement of equality that was less violent and less separated in the end than some of the other like in India for example.

After learning more about these people and the wars, the takeovers, the empires and even the early settlers, I really hope that one day our world will come to more peace. I see more now than ever that perhaps we may never truly have extreme world peace, but I do believe that if people let down their pride and greed and truly looked out for the interest of their neighbor as they did their own; we may be able to paint a colorful future without a much of the color red and the repercussion of pain and hatred.