Blog #14

Chapter 19 (pp.931-957) + Chapter 19 documents

Three main countries this section deals with are China, the Ottoman Empire, and Japan. All three tried to keep as much of their independence as possible, but many times this seemed impossible due to problems that each country faced. One of the main reasons that China had many problems was because of their huge population explosion which their agriculture production could not keep up with. Unfortunately this led to smaller farms for peasants, unemployment and starvation. The Taiping Uprising brought with it a unique type of Christianity, with leaders more or less not wanting anything to do with Buddhism, Daoism or Confucianism, looking for “a heavenly kingdom of great peace”. What was considered to be one of the most innovating processes of this time was how some of their thoughts changed with regard to gender roles, male and females could have equal shares of land. Yay for the fact that the Taiping officials ordered the feet of women to be unbound.  Another area where a lot of people had not dare go before was the basis for marriage; allowing marriage to be based on mutual attraction instead of some family arrangement. One of the largest downfalls on the part of the Chinese was how addicted to opium a large part of the population was. Opium was Britain’s largest export to Canton. The numbers were astounding; to go from 150,000 pounds per year to 3,450,000,000 pounds in roughly 55 years. The emperor decided enough was enough, and opium was outlawed.  This led to Opium War when the Chinese emperor decided to not trade with British for opium any further. Being that was Britain’s largest export to Canton, it is no wonder that this was very upsetting to them. Same thing happened with the Ottoman Empire as in China, both had been strong, but eventually were weakened because of gaps between themselves and the West with regards to their military and also their technological advances. Both the Ottoman Empire and China became fairly dependent on Europe. In the Ottoman Empire one thing that changed was the diversity in communities, including an emphasis on Christianity; they even went so far as to give non-Muslims equal rights. Yes they said everyone was equal, regardless of their religious affiliation. Japan had better military power and political skills than either China or Ottoman Empire, so it made sense they were better equipped to deal with the Europeans on a more balanced level.  However, at one point, Japan’s ranking of their people from samurai at the top of the status chart and merchants at the bottom did a complete turnaround later on, and while merchants were at the bottom of the status chart- they had money and their well-to-do status topper samurai often owed money to the merchants. Japan was better than China or the Turkey area with regards to staying low on the western radar. Europeans were not as eager to have control of Japan as they were for China and the Ottoman Empire. Japan did away with social order or status and wanted true national unity.  Japan also agreed with China and Ottoman empire that the way women were treated needed to be changed. Women needed more respect and to be treated equally with regards to many matters including marriage, divorce, and property rights.  

Call To Action Day

Call To Action Day 3/25/15

Since I transferred here, this is my first time being a part of Call To Action Day. I started off my day by picking up my awesome t-shirt and heading over to Green Hills Elementary for my Science in Action class. Every week on Thursdays, my partner and I do experiments with a special ed class and it is so much fun to see how excited these kids get when they see us come teach them a lesson because they barely get that much hands on science in their classrooms. This week we did an experiment with dry ice that went really well and then we came back to NDNU for my second part of the day where the 8^th graders from Notre Dame Elementary come here on our campus for an hour for science. We had about 27 eighth graders from next door and on this special day they get an opportunity to be scientists and actually work in our science labs which they do not have available to them at their own school. This project is also ran by the Science in Action class here and basically we set up three different experiments in three different science labs and had the teacher break them up into three groups so there would be three different rotations. The three experiments they get to try are called: Flame test, Egg in a jar, and a dry ice shooter. The flame test they get to use a Bunsen burner and test a number of chemical elements to see what color each element gives off when heated. For the egg in a jar experiment, you get to remove oxygen from a jar and watch the jar act as a vacuum and observe the hardboiled egg getting sucked into the jar. The last experiment was the dry ice experiment and you get to teach them about sublimation in forms of different mediums. We had actual Science in action class members working each station as well as a few non-science in action students participate for their work for call to action day. I mainly worked at the flame test experiment and it was really fun because we had the kids fill out a table and predict what color they thought they were going to see. The kids definitely were excited and shocked to see all the bright, cool looking colors that elements can give off because they had no idea. Most of them thought because we can’t always see elements around us that some would not give off any colors. Even though I teach a class a new experiment every week over at Green Hills, I definitely enjoyed being able to use the labs here and teach the NDE students more than they already knew. I wish we could do more days like this throughout the year instead of just one day. It’s nice to give back or give your time to people just because you want to and not just because your teacher or coach is making you for credit etc. You also got to learn more about the hallmarks of the sisters just like how number three was stated on the back of our shirts today. I heard a lot good things from other friends who did clean ups and went to other sites as well. This day also gave you a chance to interact more with other people from our school that you maybe normally don’t know well or talk to. It’s nice seeing everyone get involved and happy to do something for a good cause and I look forward to seeing what activity I get involved with for next year. One small act of kindness or piece of your time can really make someone’s day or change the world in many ways without us even knowing it and you never know who is watching so you just may be leading a good example for someone else. 

Extra Credit- Guest Speaker

3/24/15

Paul Brockmann started off his presentation by introducing himself and how he was over in Sierra Leone from October to December of 2014. He is not a doctor; he just manages medical programs and there are more than 67 countries in 2013. He is a part of an international organization called Medecins Sans Frontiers (MSF) which is known for Doctors without borders. Paul mentioned how armed conflict, malnutrition, environmental disasters, exclusion from health care and epidemics are things these countries face. These people do not get the proper food, water, shelter, etc. and so many people populations are excluded from health care and we are so unaware of it. He then focused on epidemics and Ebola in West Africa and it was shocking to see the number of cases and deaths since 2001-2002. The stations they have set –up and the protective gear and equipment the teams out there have to wear is crazy and they only get to work one hour at a time per entry and two to three hours shifts because it’s so hot. Three out of four people survived Ebola and people around the world all of sudden freak out but if we get more people in the world to care enough to help out these other countries. He did say however that when you are fortunate there will be vaccinations. On the bright side they are seeing more survivals and Ebola is not the most dangerous one and can be controlled by the type of work MSF is doing. It's very sad to see how some of these families struggle and can't connect with their families the same because they have to stay inside the facilities depending on how much they were at risk. He finally spoke of how most of the countries they work with are affected by war and colonialism. It mainly comes from a lot of complicated history, human anger and greed in people and because there is not enough passion. “Communities organize themselves”.  Last but not least don’t take what we have for granted! Overall I loved his slideshow because it was not just filled with a thousand words on each slide and had some really great pics to show and because it’s so serious he definitely did a great job or presenting and left me very much informed than before I listened to him. 

Blog #13

Catholic Social Teaching Handout

Poverty stricken areas are found in every country around the world. Some countries have small areas which can be found sparsely scattered about, while other countries are mainly made up of areas of poverty. Catholic social teachings are that all people have a moral obligation to do whatever they can to help alleviate the suffering of all humans world-wide.  The Church states that the Church itself, each nation and international agencies that come together on behalf of this cause must work together to find ways to help development in all countries that are so poor and underdeveloped. Trying to help with such underdeveloped areas could start with international agencies comprised of people from all countries that address excess tools from countries being taken to these impoverished areas. Whether these tools are needed for education, farming or whatever each of these countries need, along with directions and teachings on the proper way to utilize what is given to them so they can succeed with these tools properly.  An ongoing question within the Church has been what caused all of this poverty in the first place. Some are interested in “placing blame” on where all of these problems started.   What is more important is the history we have learned of what happened hundreds of years ago with colonization and even before that time,  and how dominating powers had such control over other areas, was good for few and bad for many. The “blame game” should only be played to make sure history stops repeating itself when it involves these matters. Yes, in badly impoverished countries there desperately needs to be dramatic changes, yet even here in the United States, in each state, in each city, county and town there are areas where people are starving and homeless.  In our country as well as many countries around the world, the percentage of people that are affected by poverty is low compared to third world countries, yet it still does exist. But many times comparisons seem weak because of everything our countries have available to us compared to these third world countries. There need to be more international agencies that are comprised of people from around the world working together within the same agency to help all countries to combat poverty and find ways to use all the excess nonperishable items, tools, school books, and every item that someone may be throwing away into landfills, to help with the problems facing others.

Blog #12

Chapter 18 (pp. 879-912) 

One of the problems that existed with industrialism was the conflict with what “class” people belonged to. Europeans, who as time went on, thought imperialism was the solution to gaining control over the countries they were already dealing with for their imports. If they controlled the countries that had the products their own factories needed, they figured that was all the better and cheaper for them, while at the same time getting more worldly power and control. The wanted their own nation (nationalism) to take control over as much as they could. All the while this was happening, the one huge underlying factor in everything was racism.  Europeans believing that there had to be distinction and distance between blacks and whites. The same held true for different religions. At one point some Europeans actually came to a point where they married Asian and African “elites”  however then came the point in time where some racisms changed. Instead of just being about color or religions, science played a role and in their own “sick” ways people made determinations/conclusions about someone’s worth and intelligence having to do with the size of their skulls. Of course the Europeans believed themselves to be far superior than any other countries, and sarcastically assumed they would have to civilize the rest of the countries people. Unfortunately because of Europe’s wealth and military advantage, they built many European empires in Africa and Asia. Not to anyone today, but shocking back in the day, Europeans were often fighting against themselves as to which country would gain control of certain areas. As with all invasions of villages and communities, with new people taking over, they brought disease along with them and many “native” people died either from these diseases, or from working so hard as to be able to survive. The European colonial empires literally did away with many small African villages, killing people or burning down their huts. Rebellions happened as a result of natives and their lands being invaded, which made some Europeans try to to convert the natives to an agreeable co-existence so to speak. It still kept coming down to the fact that racism on all levels was still prevalent. Whether it was the color of skin, or wealth or religion, Europeans were never going to stop thinking of themselves as superior. Some of the natives in Africa and Asia appear to convert over to Christianity purely for the reason of making their own lives easier. It may have made some of their lives easier but it did nothing to help get rid of the prejudices felt by many. These prejudices are still felt today, with regards to everything; color, gender, and religions are still today, in what is supposed to be a more educated, caring and compassionate world, the same as they were thousands of years ago. Even back in the day when they realized that there needed to be “joined” forces between people, natives and Europeans, one country and another, in order to be able to produce and survive, some were only able to do so for a short time before rebellions or wars broke out. It is even stated that looking back all those years ago, even though it was not labeled “global warming” back then, that is exactly what was taking place with some of the things they did agriculturally. Very disheartening to know how many hundreds of years ago, many of the problems that were started or ongoing, are still problems we encounter today.