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1. • CommentAuthorlooneynerd
   • CommentTimeJul 27th 2009

    (5230.1)
   @Kosmo
   
   We also see a major floundering of the Caliphates. North Africa breaks off into it's own Caliphate. The Seljuks are either wiped out by mongols or become largely independent. The Ottomans take over much of Turkey, while the Fatimids control parts of Egypt and Arabia. This is in stark contrast to the one or two centralized governments which had existed in the past. Add to that constant pressure by tribal groups, Christians, Indians, and a wealth of others, and there was less time and money for the arts and sciences, which had flourished in large part because of massive funding from the large Imperial governments.
2. • CommentAuthorFan
   • CommentTimeJul 27th 2009

    (5230.2)
   @Nygaard
   
   You might like _Civilisation_ by Kenneth Clark: it's Europe, but very much about art and cvilization (if it were any *more* about art then it would be a history of art instead of a history of civilization).
3. • CommentAuthorlooneynerd
   • CommentTimeJul 28th 2009

    (5230.3)
   Seeing as it's a big topic, I"m going to explain my take on why the Middle East is how it is. My theory (I didn't create it, mind you) combines ideas from a number of historiographical theories and philosophies, namely the Annales School, Conflict History, Marxist History, World History, and a few others (but I won't get into the minutiae of Historiography, unless you'd really like :P) It's a theory that's taught at most major American and European Universities, but it isn't necessarily universally accepted. With that disclaimer, here goes...
   
   
   There are two primary reasons that the modern mid-east is how it is today. The first, which eventually caused the second, was the discovery of the Americas. One reason the Islamic World was so powerful for so long was because of simple economics; nearly all trade traveling between Europe, Africa, and Asia had to, at some point, travel through the Dar al-Salaam (house of peace, used to refer to any country with a majority population of Muslims regardless of sect or national affiliation). The only real alternate route was the dangerous "North Silk Road", which passed through Siberia and went far out of the way of most major trade centers (the main exception being Kiev, of course). Every piece of silk, every spice, every cylinder of Damascus steel in Europe had had Islamic taxes imposed upon it at some point during it's journey. Every traveler going to China (like Marco Polo) paid sometimes hefty tolls to the Caliphs, Sultans, petty Tribal Lords, and Emperors in the middle east for safe passage. This made, as one would expect, the Middle East insanely rich. Look at the domes on most Mosques in large cities built between the Eleventh and sixteenth century; it's almost always plated with gold. When I say rich, I'm talking unimaginably rich; officers in Salah ad-Din's army were denoted by jeweled helmets, and most of the Caliphs, when going to war, had to be held aloft by a dozen servants because of the amount of gold and jewels that decorated their armor. The palaces of Baghdad had fountains that ran with mercury. I shit you not. These riches financed practical things to; the great Islamic scholars, poets, scientists, mathematicians, and engineers were largely supported by nobles, often paid simply to think for the sake of it. Then the Americas were discovered, and the world economic scale shifted dramatically. Suddenly, most trade was being done by sea. The Europeans could get nearly anything they wanted from the Americas, at a much lower price, or use newly-discovered sea routes to bypass the old silk road. Suddenly, the Islamic world's only real means of wealth was gone. By this point, the big powers in the Region were the Ottomans (Ruling from Eastern Europe to Western Iran) and the Safavids (Persians). There were others (Various North African States, the Sultanate of Oman, etc.), but the Ottomans and Safavids represent the big, important powers in this discussion, so we'll stick with them.
   
   These powers, formerly powerhouses, had begun to stagnate. The Ottomans wouldn't gain a truly modern military again until the peak of the Tanzimat reforms in the 1850s (at which point, the Ottoman Empire only had around 60 years left in its life), and was constantly wracked by internal revolts by Arabs and Kurds, a number of disastrous wars against the Eastern Europeans and the previously mentioned economic strife. The Safavids were even worse off, fighting Ottomans, Russians, Indians and Afghanis, Uzbeks, and tribes too numerous to list. Iran was in an even worse state because, unlike the Ottomans who controlled the fertile regions of Anatolia, Egypt, and the Levant, Iran controlled little fertile land in relation to it's population.
   
   Continued on Next Post.
4. • CommentAuthorlooneynerd
   • CommentTimeJul 28th 2009

    (5230.4)
   Continued from last post
   
   Okay, so a lot so far, but this is where it get's really complicated, so I'll try to keep it brief. During this period, both powers attempt military modernizations by sending scholars to Europe, who is now getting really good and building things like Cannon and firearms. Realizing that the Ottomans (who, if they can get the technology, still have the numbers and wealth to possible re-invade Europe) could become a major threat, Europe (mainly the power players of England and France, and to a lesser extent Spain) begin sanctioning the middle east. Rebel groups such as Muhammad Ali's Egyptian revolution are spurred on (in Ali's case, by the English) and even given arms and training. In exchange for protection from these groups, the Islamic powers begin to be forced to sign hundreds of disasterous treaties. Exports sent to Europe pay no tariffs, while goods being sent from Europe are taxed at seven times their previous rates. France and England actually take over currency production for the Ottomans, effectively controlling the entire Ottoman economy, with control of the Sultan's treasury actually being given to European banks. Needless to say, this fucks them. Farmers stop farming because of the taxes they're forced to pay, and because European and American-Continent goods are cheaper. Corruption takes over, rebel groups continue to thrive, and it's more or less a bad time to live there. (sounds a bit like modern free trade practices, don't it?)
   
   Then, starting in the late 1700's, a new thing begins to develop. Taking from Western Ideals like nationalism and ethnocentrism, groups of Islamic scholars begin writing new Sharia. Fueled by the strife affecting the region, and by the hatred being more and more directed against the west, this new Sharia becomes more and more confrontational, conservative, violent, and anti-western. This is, my friends, the birth of radical Islam. Wahabists form in Iraq and Iran, the Muslim Brotherhood is founded in Egypt, etc. etc. These groups espouse Arab nationalism based on extreme Islamic law. "People of the Book" (Jews and Christians, until this point equal citizens throughout most of the Islamic world) begin to lose rights and be persecuted. A few coups and revolts break out, but for the most part it acts like a cancer, simmering beneath the surface, slowly eating away at things.
   
   (One more post to go after this, and it's short, I promise)
5. • CommentAuthorlooneynerd
   • CommentTimeJul 28th 2009

    (5230.5)
   Continued from previous posts
   
   
   Jump forward to 1919. The First World War has just ended. The Ottoman Empire is forced to give up nearly all of it's territory and soon after dissolves during the Turkish Revolution. The League of nations (in reality, the victorious allies) partitions the middle east. Countries like Iraq, Transjordan (which eventually split to form Syria, Jordan, and parts of Lebanon) the Palestinian block, etc. come into existence, ruled as colonies by proxy. As oil is discovered, it's heavily exploited, and most Muslims become poverty stricken. However, there is now hope. English and French diplomats (the United States had taken rights to certain oil revenues, but little actual land) begin promising something new. When the area stabalizes, a new Caliphate will be formed. A great Arab-Islamic state stretching from Iraq to Egypt, a democratic theocratic monarchy based upon the joint ideals of the European Enlightenment and what is rapidly forming to be a new Islamic Renaissance. Unlike the Ottomans (who were largely Turks with Jewish and Christian administrators) who had ruled this area for centuries, this would be an Arab state, populated by Arabs, ruled by Arabs. Jerusalem and much of the Levant are promised to the Palestinian people as a show of good faith for their assistance during the war, and things seem like they're beginning to recover.
   
   But there's a problem. The Jewish people are craving a state. Suffering hardships in the many countries in which they live (discrimination in the United States, Segregation in much of Europe, and outright Persecution and murder in Russia and Eastern Europe) an idea begins to that they'd be better off with their own home. Many throughout the world support this, and many of the early thinkers on the subject (Jewish and non-Jewish alike) propose many locations for this new state. Parts of the still Sparsely inhabited United States, Areas of the Russian steppe, pacific Islands, South American territories, and many, many other are proposed as the land for this new state. They all have supporters and detractors, benefits and disadvantages. One group, the Zionists, believe that the only true place for a Jewish state is the "land of milk and honey", Israel. However, only something major is going to lead to the formation of a Jewish Nation.
   
   And then it happens. The second world war and the holocaust. There is overwhelming support for the Jewish cause in the wake of the atrocities suffered by the Jewish people. What happens next is a bit blurry; some claim that a Jewish conspiracy allows them to pick and choose where the new state will be, others that sympathy allowed them more power than may have been wise, and dozens of other theories, ranging from the crazy to the racist to the logical, are still debated today.
   
   What happens though, is that the Zionists win their fight. Israel is taken from the Palestinains, promised to them for half a decade, and given to what would become the Israelis. Plans for a new Caliphate fall through, the mid east is farther partitioned, and the modern middle east is fully formed. The arab-israeli conflict beigns in the late 40's, with the Arabs (and by proxy most Muslims) believing that what was promised them was taken away by the west and the Israelis fighting hard for their new home, determined to never again be subjected by another group ever again. The west, particularly the new global super power the United States, supports Israel, with most early Israeli military hardware being strictly American (Sherman Tanks, Mustang Fighters, and Garand Rifles). The first Arab-Israli war is a crushing victory for Israel. They begin the partitioning of Israel itself, and what many call the subjugation of the Palestinians. Believing that trust in the west is what has caused their betrayal and defeat, radical Islam becomes king, and hatred for the west is fully cemented.
6. • CommentAuthorlooneynerd
   • CommentTimeJul 28th 2009

    (5230.6)
   Okay, time for me to stop talking for a while and to listen! My university is having some of it's graduate students run a study, and being one of those people, I snagged the "online community" portion of the project. So here's what I'm asking (and the focus of the study): How to make the teaching of history better. What are the methods teachers and professors have used to help you learn about history? What are the topics that stick with you the best, and what are the ones you find the hardest to remember or study?
   
   Up until now, there's been a tendency for Professors of History to just write on a board (or maybe do a powerpoint) and lecture. Why? Well, we're never actually taught how to teach in the way that say, a high school teacher is. We're trained on our area of specialty, Historical theory, and how to write and research, but we almost never learn how to teach students. So we just do it the way our professors taught us. Now though, with dropping scores in Geography and History (subjects normally taught together, inter-relatedly, and by the same professors) there's a push to actually, you know, teach us how to teach.
7. •  
     CommentAuthorBrendan McGinley
   • CommentTimeJul 28th 2009

    (5230.7)
   I had a great history teacher who made sure we were hearing a story rather than writing down dates.
   
   However, I've long thought it'd be worth trying to establish the world as it is and then work backward via the immediate preceding events. In that way, the conclusion of each successive chapter on the teaching timeline ends up a light review of the preceding chapter. So if you want to teach about 9/11 you go back to Afghanistan, then your next lesson is about the cold war, then World War II itself, then World War I, etc.
8. •  
     CommentAuthorJess
   • CommentTimeJul 28th 2009 edited

    (5230.8)
   "Up until now, there's been a tendency for Professors of History to just write on a board (or maybe do a powerpoint) and lecture. Why? Well, we're never actually taught how to teach in the way that say, a high school teacher is. We're trained on our area of specialty, Historical theory, and how to write and research, but we almost never learn how to teach students. So we just do it the way our professors taught us. Now though, with dropping scores in Geography and History (subjects normally taught together, inter-relatedly, and by the same professors) there's a push to actually, you know, teach us how to teach."
   
   I'm going to respectfully disagree with this, as I find that very few historians do just the lecture/powerpoint these days. And certainly, I've seen plenty of literature (and first hand evidence!) that teaching needs to be hands on. So I while think you're exaggerating the situation somewhat, I do think historians need to adapt to technology a bit better. On that note, you might want to take a look at the May or June issue of AHA Perspectives, which is all about History and New Media. It was an interesting issue, and I think it represents the direction many of us want to take. I helped teach a graduate seminar in the spring in which the goal of the course was to create a website for teaching. It seems like this is a new trend.
   
   These days, many graduate departments have compulsory coursework on teaching. But I agree -- I think there's a general failure to treat teaching as a serious component of the MA/PhD in history and much more needs to be done. We aren't trained as teachers, but as historians who have to teach. I am curious about your findings, so I hope you share them with us here if this isn't going to be a published study. The topic is close to my heart -- I recently did a panel on teaching history, and as a consequence, a friend and I are thinking about a grant proposal to create a teaching resource for graduate students in history programs.
   
   EDIT: I am still randomly capitalizing as a result of looking at 18th century documents for the past two weeks. Pardon me. :)
9. • CommentAuthorlooneynerd
   • CommentTimeJul 28th 2009 edited

    (5230.9)

   On that note, you might want to take a look at the May or June issue of AHA Perspectives, which is all about History and New Media. It was an interesting issue, and I think it represents the direction many of us want to take. I helped teach a graduate seminar in the Spring in which the goal of the course was to create a website for teaching. It seems like this is a new trend.

   
   
   It actually sitting on my desk right now, along with a recent MESA report on the findings, amongst others :D
   
   EDIT:
   

   EDIT: I am still randomly capitalizing as a result of looking at 18th century documents for the past two weeks. Pardon me. :)

   
   
   I do it all the time. Look at just about any post I've ever made. Side-effect of the trade I suppose :P
10. •  
      CommentAuthormister hex
    • CommentTimeJul 28th 2009

     (5230.10)
    History is more than just names and dates. There has to be an engagement with the Story of History, as Brendan mentioned. That's what the best high school history teachers do.
    
    My sister always said it's like a game - the more you play, the more you want to keep playing.
    Don't know if that's helpful at all.
11. •  
      CommentAuthorJess
    • CommentTimeJul 28th 2009

     (5230.11)
    Good to know. If you want recommendations for reading on this subject, I'm happy to share some titles that I think are worthwhile.
    
    And not to be an ethics nag, but shouldn't you have some kind of release form for soliciting responses for a study? Or are you just trying to draft questions for one? I'm not trying to be mean or quash what strikes me as an important conversation, but I wouldn't want you to get in trouble down the line. I'm not entirely clear what you're trying to do or what this is for, but you should explain this up front. If this is simply an informal conversation, disregard this.
12. • CommentAuthorlooneynerd
    • CommentTimeJul 28th 2009 edited

     (5230.12)
    This is more informal than anything. Simply inter-departmental, non-published, kind of "how can we be better based on anecdotal evidence" type of thing. It won't even be implemented, at least for the time being. At this point it's just informal asking around trying to get a better idea of what we're working with.
    
    Edit
    
    But if anybody is worried about getting credit, I'll be sure to have a linkback to the thread while we're exchanging the ideas we got. Although the thought of having advisers, professors, and associates on whitechapel is a frightening idea indeed...
13. •  
      CommentAuthorJess
    • CommentTimeJul 28th 2009 edited

     (5230.13)
    I'd still like to know what you come up with. I think that some of the responses will be more useful if you and your audience come to an agreement on what history is before they answer how it can better be taught.
    
    To some of the people who have responded -- I personally don't believe in a "story" of history, but I don't subject my students to rote memorization. :) I'm going to bite my tongue for a little bit, because I am curious as to how you all might define history, and I imagine this will give LN some insight into how historians should be taught to teach. We all may be on the same track more or less, but it's good to make sure...!
    
    LN -- Just based on the responses you've already gotten, you might find Sam Wineburg's book (Historical Thinking and Other Unnatural Acts) to be useful.
    
    EDIT: There are some history profs on this forum already, best as I can tell from previous threads. And I've directed some to read Warren's request for historical subjects to write an OGN. Honestly, it's not that frightening. :)
14. • CommentAuthorFan
    • CommentTimeJul 28th 2009

     (5230.14)
    > What are the methods teachers and professors have used to help you learn about history?
    
    Firstly, field trips. I read once that some (most) people learn by seeing; some by hearing; and some (fewest) more by touching and feeling. Actually visiting the sites (and to a lesser extent, seeing artefacts isolated in museums) helped to make things (especially day-to-day life, less often one-off events like battles) real for me, easier to imagine and remember: seeing the size of the places and the horizon, feeling the climate, imagining it happening there (instead of it all happening in some 2-dimensional nowhere within my mind), etc.
    
    Secondly, historical novels: like Mary Renault's, or Hornblower, for example. Take anything from that source with a pinch of salt, but still: it's memorable that way. I prefer it (I care to remember more of it) if the novel was recommended to me by a historian as being worthy. I don't put so much (if any) historical faith in movies, though: although they may be memorable dramatically, I don't imagine that (say) the movie of Lawrence of Arabia is in any way historical (although for all I know it might be to some extent, I can't assess how much), or that Ustinov's portrayal of Nero was accurate. I don't want to imply that my dad had anything against Nero, but he hated, hated _Gladiator_ (for its historical inaccuracy).
    
    Thirdly, I learned Maths (for example) by *practice*: I was taught the theory during half the class, and then (second half of class) given new exercises to solve using that theory/technique, so that I learned to apply it. I can't say much as much about history (because I stopped getting any formal history lessons when I was about 11 years old), but back when I was given any history homework, or a history exam, at that (school) level it was typically only to summarise and/or to memorise the contents of a text book; so comparatively history required of me less action, participation, and new techniques: instead, just "facts" (which were actually only hearsay, with no evidence presented) to remember more or less well (c.f. 1066 and all that).
    
    Some people like biographies, also; but that may depend on the biography, and/or it may be an acquired taste.
    
    > What are the topics that stick with you the best, and what are the ones you find the hardest to remember or study?
    
    I suppose for me I liked to know how people lived: their technology, buildings, clothes, transport, agriculture, social organization, occupations and trades; and to imagine what their mental landscape might have been like: what they believed, what they feared etc. The fact that slaves at Washington's house had to whistle as they carried the masters' dinner (to prove they weren't eating from it as they carried it) is more memorable to me now that whatever happened at whichever battle site it was we visited.
    
    Less interesting and less memorable are dates, and place-names, and especially the names of battles which have no further details except that, you know, Prince Rupert or someone like that, whoever he was, lost that one.
    
    (to be continued)
15. • CommentAuthorFan
    • CommentTimeJul 28th 2009 edited

     (5230.15)
    > Up until now, there's been a tendency for Professors of History to just write on a board (or maybe do a powerpoint) and lecture.
    
    Apart from taking me to see places (and, talking), the one history book that my dad's ever given me recently is Civilisation. It's actually based on a TV series, and that kind of shows: for example the opening sentences of the first chapter, "I am standing on the Pont des Arts in Paris. On one side of the Seine is the harmonious, reasonable facade of the Institute of France, built as a etc." and I can imagine what he's talking about: it engages my image-ination and my sense of location; and especially then this magnificent seque: "At some time in the ninth century one could have looked down the Seine and seen the prow of a Viking ship coming up the river. Looked at today in the British Museum it as a powerful work of art; but to the mother of a family trying to settle down in her little hut, it would have seemed less agreeable -- as menacing to her civilisation as the periscope of a nuclear submarine" (and then goes on to talk about how classical literature survived the Dark Ages).
    
    Historians might be keener on words that most other people are, and something a little more multi-sensory and personal (like, where I imagine that I'm there/then, at least to see and hear if not to act) might be more memorable.
    
    As a young child I had a fair collection (maybe 30) of "Ladybird" history books like this one which I take it are out of print now, on subjects ranging from Stone Age life on the chalk downs all the way through Florence Nightingale to life in the modern army. Apart from being sturdy and informative they had a nice illustration (young Alexander leading Boukephalos in a halter as the armoured adults watch, for example) on every other page ... a picture showing one the siege engines he used to take Tyre ... the army's tracks through the desert on the way home ... anyway, you get the picture.
    
    Humour is a good thing too. My dad says he's given his students the "What have the Romans ever done for us?" as part of his class, and apparently that went well.
    
    Yeah, and slides, too. When he lectures on something, he's been there, and he has the slides (took pictures while he was there). Part of preparing a lecture is selecting slides to illustrate what he's talking about; so going to a lecture engages the eye as well as the ear.
    
    The thing that I don't understand about History Professors, listening to them talking, is that they can talk for hours and hours and hours and hours about ... things, facts, things they've memorised and can say without looking them up. They must have a prodigious memory. I don't know how they do it. You too, look at how many languages you've learned, some of them recently (i.e. when you were an adult), presumably: all that vocabulary. I have a bit of a memory, myself, I'm a software developer and I find that I somehow visualize software (give it a virtual shape), and remember where bits of it are where (i.e. within what shape, what software component); but more so I've learned techniques, like I know "how to drive a car" (a technique), and how to read a map and roadsigns (more techniques), and how to react (e.g. to slow down) in order to get from A to B, whereas what a history professor does seems to me like remembering every pebble along the way.
16. • CommentAuthorFan
    • CommentTimeJul 28th 2009

     (5230.16)
    > I am curious as to how you all might define history
    
    I think my dad once defined "history" as the period of time that starts with the written records: no written records implies no history. You can still do archaeology for that period, but it's "pre-historic".
17. •  
      CommentAuthortrini_naenae
    • CommentTimeJul 28th 2009

     (5230.17)
    I am also in the "emphasis the story" camp. However, when I say that, I mean talk about the important people involved and get into their personality and their motives, if we know them. When I was in Florence, I went on lots of tours that more or less centered around history. One tour guide was particularly good because she treated the subjects (in this case Cosimo I and his wife Elenora and their family) as if they were people instead of a bunch of facts and dates. I also remember learning about the Treaty of Versailles, the Weimar Republic and then the eventual rise of the Nazis and finding it interesting since it ultimately was about what happened as a result of the Treaty of Versailles. History comes alive to me when it is about people and the way they thought and the motives they had for the things they did and what happened as a result of that. The dates just help put everything together in relation to each other.
18. •  
      CommentAuthoremsie
    • CommentTimeJul 29th 2009

     (5230.18)
    Hmm...this thread has made for an interesting read, thank you!
19. • CommentAuthorMWHS
    • CommentTimeJul 29th 2009

     (5230.19)
    @looneynerd - Thanks, that was a really good read. I knew a few bits and pieces of Middle Eastern history, but that's the first good narrative of post-crusade events that I've read. The only thing that comes to mind was whether the high taxation on overland trade helped to spur advances in ship building and navigation, or whether they were co-incidental?
20. • CommentAuthorKosmopolit
    • CommentTimeJul 29th 2009

     (5230.20)
    Atlantic ship-building - think the vikings - had been well in advance of the supposedly more advanced Mediterranean cultures since at least the Roman times. (Julius Caesar's plans to invade Britain were frustrated when his fleet was defeated by a British fleet.)
    
    From what I've read there were two big factors in the rising interest in long-distance overseas trade.
    
    One was the arab monopoly on trade with East Asia.
    
    The other was the conversion of the Poles, Finns and other other Baltic peoples to Christianity.
    
    The medieval church taught that it was a sin to enslave fellow Christians but not pagans and Muslims.
    
    There was a thriving trans-European trade in slaves from the Baltic tribes but when they all became Christian that supply dried up and the Europeans had to buy their slaves from the Muslims.