The Spanish Armada—its defeat put England at the head
of western civilization in 1588.
Unit Objectives
By the time you finish this unit, you should
be able to:
Consider how to talk about history and civilization.
Practice some study, thinking, and research skills concerning
history.
Introduction
This course considers developments from about 1500 A.D.
to the present, moving forward chronologically as we go. But
before we begin our journey from past to present, we need
to take stock of the present. By doing so we will have some
sense of the destination that awaits us.
The above audio introduction, read by
Dr.Stephen Ruzicka, presents a brief introduction to The Age
of Revolutions.
Why bother? After all, we exist in the present, so we ought
to know what it’s like already. True, we ought to know.
But actually we seldom try to describe what seems utterly
familiar. If we do try, we probably don’t work at producing
a really comprehensive picture of things. However, this is
important, when we study history. Knowing the end results
of the past (so far) helps us decide which developments in
the past played a special role in leading up to the present.
We can’t possibly know or understand everything about
the past, especially the more distant past; but when we identify
a kind of “storyline,” we can begin to judge what
in the past was central to the unfolding of our story.
In a nutshell, we want to find some way of describing what
the world is like right now, roughly the late 20th -early
21st century. Since we are focusing on “western civilization”
and not the entire world, let’s start by trying to understand
those two words, “civilization” and “western.”
Then we will see if we can apply some descriptive terms to
get at certain characteristic features of western civilization.
We also want to find out about how a civilization manifests
itself—what different forms cultural expression can
take.
One thing to keep in mind as you study is the nature
of change—that it is often unplanned, accidental,
and/or simply the result of several other factors. Many of
these “revolutions” that we will be studying can
only be recognized through hindsight. Such revolutions do
not necessarily occur because “the people wanted change”
nor can we assume that they resulted from some sort of divine
intent.
Intro
to Course
