how to read a book

How to Read a Book

What to Look For as You Read

• The main characteristics in the major civilizations• Cross-civilizational patterns of migration, trade and

exchange, spread of religion, disease, plant exchange, & cultural interchange within and among major societies—SIMILARITIES

• The basic features of agricultural economies• How key aspects of the past & present have been shaped

by global forces, e.g., exchange of technology & ideas• Assess continuity and change over time• Common impulses in the human experience

What is Global History?

A study of the evolution and development of the world’s leading civilizations

Major stages in the nature and degree of interactions among different peoples and societies

around the globe

The Emergence of World History

“Not until the 20th century, with an increase in the international contacts and a vastly expanded knowledge of the historical patterns of major societies did a full world history become possible.”

14th Century Arab historian Ibn

Khaldun

River Valleys as Central

• Nile (Egypt)

• Tigris-Euphrates (Mesopotamia—the Middle East)

• Indus (India)

• Yellow (China)

Flood waters renewed soil, kept it fertile; drew animal life to the banks;

provided means of transporting goods & people

What is Civilization?

• Cities (versus a nomadic lifestyle)• Well-organized central governments, bureaucracies• Complex religions• Job specialization—specialized occupations• Social classes—differentiated social status• Arts & architecture• Public works (temples, palaces, irrigation systems, roads,

bridges, walls)• Writing (tax rolls, business or marriage contracts)• Long distance trading networks

Must all these be present for civilization to exist?

Civilization• “Most humans have always shown a tendency to operate

in groups that provide a framework for economic activities, governance, and cultural forms-beliefs and artistic styles”

• Civilizations “generate surpluses beyond survival needs”• Civilizations give “human groups the capacity to

fundamentally reshape their environments and to dominate most other living creatures”

• “A genuinely global definition of what it means to be civilized should focus on underlying patterns of social development that are common to complex societies throughout history”

The Problem of Ethnocentrism

• “The tendency to judge other peoples’ cultural forms solely on the basis of how much they resemble one’s own”

• This requires an international approach on our part

• “In the West, world history depended on a growing realization that the world could not be understood simply as a mirror reflecting the West’s greater glory or a stage for Western-dominated power politics”—LeRoy don’t want the ball, Coach!”

The Criteria for Determining what Constitutes a “Period” in History

• A geographic rebalancing among major civilization areas—changing boundaries

• An increase in the intensity and extent of interaction across civilizations

• The emergence of new and roughly parallel developments in most, if not all, of these major civilizations

Periodization of World History

Period #1

World history developments before 1000 C.E.—“Pre-history” & Emergence of Early

Regional CivilizationsC. E. = A. D.

B. C. E. = B. C.

Period #2

The Classical Period—“a new capacity to integrate larger regions and diverse groups of people through overarching cultural political systems

1000 B.C. E – 500 C. E.

Period #3

The “Postclassical Era”—”emergence of new commercial and cultural linkages that

brought most civilizations into contact with one another and with nomadic

groups; the decline of the great classical empires, the rise of new civilizational

centers, and the emergence of a network of world contacts (especially commercial),

including the spread of major religious systems

Period #4

The Shrinking World---1450-1750

The rise of the West, the intensification to new levels of global contacts, the growth of

trade, and the formation of new empires.

Period #5

Industrialization & Western Global Hegemony, 1750-1914

Industrialization of Europe and European Imperial expansion; increase & intensification of commercial interchange, technoiogical innovations, & cultural contacts

Period #620th Century in World History—Are we at a crossroads? Are new global patterns on the horizon?

The retreat of Western Imperialism; the rise of new political systems like communism; the surge of the U. S. & U.S.S.R.; a host of economic innovations and inventions

Themes• Commonalities among societies, e.g., impact of

technological change on environment, social structure, gender equity

• Contacts / interplay between civilizations• Tensions between established traditions and forces of

change brought by trade, migration• What role did individuals play—human agency as

part of world-historical causation• Changing patterns of inequality• Nomads and international connections

Structure & Organization of the Book

• “Part Introductions”—identifies fundamental new characteristics of parallel or comparable developments and regional or international exchange that define each period—Key Themes

• “Chapter Introductions”—identifies key themes and analytical issues: chief strengths, causes for deterioration, decline, collapse

• “Timelines—major “events, countries, in all societies discussed in chapter”

• “On the Web”—annotated websites—should help in writing your six weeks essays

Happy

Reading!