The Opium Wars

The Opium Wars was a war between China and Britan. This war was due to the Opium which is a drug that British got from India and Sold it to China. The war started when the Chinese Emperor asked the british to stop selling opium because the chinese got very addicted to this drug and this drug was causing a lot of problems for China economically, and politically. The chinese goverment got very tired of this drug and when Britan didn't stop selling Opium the chinese got angry and started a war.
The war was won by Britan. At the time of the China didn't have the power to match with Britan. The War was fought at Sea and at the time Britan had the best ships in the world at the time and the chinese didn't. Britan had guns and cannons on their ships and the chinese didn't. The British ships were steamed powered and the Chinese had old ships which were no match for Britan. The war was a insulting for China and the Britan won very eaisly and continued to sell Opium to China.

"The White Man's Burden"

The White Man's burden, a poem by Rudyard Kipling. This poem was wrote during the Spanish American war and when the Americans took over the phillipines. This poem was mostly about the troubles the "white" went through to take over the phillipines. When they actually troubled the phillipines. Americans thought they were the strongest country and the had to teach the other countries how to be like them.

I agree with the poem. I think that the white men that tried to take over the Phillipines went through a lot of troubles. And from what I think Burden means problems. So therefore, I agree with the poem.

I don't think that America is an imperialistic nation anymore. I don't think we are still living the White Man's Bruden.

"The Scramble for Africa"

Some people think that African Imperialisms is the British going into Africa and taking over the land and the African People. But that’s not true European imperialisms are many of the European nations going into Africa and trying to establish their colony there. From what I the scramble of Africa is when many of the European nations went into Africa and broke apart different nations to make their colony and now day’s countries, which were caused by the European nations. So basically I would say the scramble for Africa is the fighting of different European nations for land in Africa.
There were many nations involved with The Scramble of Africa but a few major nations are France, Britain, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, and Italy. All these nations were looking for land and raw materials in Africa. Land was the major thing these nations were looking for. Britain and France had most of the African land, France had most of the north - eastern African land and Britain had some land North - East, some land South - West, and some was all over Africa. Belgium had the least amount of land in Africa.
All these nations were looking for raw materials for their factories in Britain and land to manufacture more good. European nations were able to so easily dominate Africa because they had many technological advances. The Europeans had automatic guns, cannons, much more destructive weapons and stuff like binoculars and compasses.
This scramble really badly affected the African people. This is because when European countries put borders to make different countries in Africa they would some times put two enemy tribes together or split up two really friendly tribes. This wasn't really good for the people because if tribes in two different countries go to war then much powerful countries like Britain and France might have to go to war also.

Film Lesson: "Mountains of the Moon"

Mountains of the Moon a very interesting movie, this movie is about the time after the Industrial Revolution when Europeans needed more materials for their big factories and more land for more factories. When the Europeans tried to take over Africa. In this movie Europeans were looking for the Source of the Nile River.
The Europeans faced many hardships to takeover Africa. It also took them a while to take over Africa. But at last they were successful. It wasn't very easy for them to win though. It was always a very hard fight for both sides. In the movie they showed how African tribes would sneak into their camp at nighttime and try to kill them and their people. In the move the character of Richard Burten gets attacked by a spear between his mouth. Which was very painful and described the type of hardships that the Europeans had to face. Another character, John Speak was captured by an African tribe and had his legs stabbed and broken. On his second trip to Africa a bug crawled into his ear and he had a very painful time by the way it was described or showed in the movie.
In the movie the lake that they found which is the source of the Nile River is now named after the Queen of England. That is not really that strange. Because when a country discovers something new, which has existed for other people for more than 100 years, is some how there and they decide to name it what ever they want. I guess they wanted it named after their Queen because she was like the main head person of England at that time.
England's technological advances helped a lot in talking over Africa because the Africans had very simple weapons like sharp knives and spears. But England had automatic guns, they had cannons and they had stuff like binoculars from which they could see people and animals from very far. So England’s technological advances were the main reason they were successful at taking over Africa.
England was able to take over Africa so quickly because of the technological advances in weapons and they had more medication to fight diseases that the people got in Africa so England was able to take over Africa really quickly

The Meiji Restoration of Japan

Matthew Perry a U.S. navy commodore. He helped the U.S. sign a trade treaty with Japan because U.S. wanted a port so they can trade with a country, which had been cutoff with rest of the world. He was asked to leave by the Japanese people but he refused to go and demanded to show them a letter by the U.S. president of that time. He said he would use force if he were denied to do what he wanted to. The Japanese couldn't say anything because they were really impressed by the new western technology that Perry had brought with him. They were very afraid because the ships that Perry sailed on had cannons on them and the Japanese thought that Perry was going to blow up their island so they couldn't stop him.
The American ha so many thing which the Japanese saw from which they were amazed. The Americans had cannons, automatic guns, and most of all the steam power ship. The Japanese had never seen anything like that.
So therefore, the Japanese had to sign the treaty. The Treaty Of Kanagawa, which really helped the U.S. The treaty said that Japan and The U.S.A were alliances, It gave American Ships the right to purchase any necessary things that they needed, It opened two ports for American ships in Japan, and Japan committed to help any American ship around the Japanese coast.
This treaty also helped Japan a lot. Because of cultural diffusion. When ships from other countries came they brought with themselves culture, which the Japanese people started to use. The Japanese got a lot of good ideas from many other countries and used them for itself. And make Japan very strong and a very powerful country. They had adapted ideas like education, industrialization. Soon Japan had stuff like railroads, telephones, and factories. Just like many other very modern countries.
Now Japan is one of the most technically advanced countries in the world. Now days Japan makes some of the best cars in the world, is where all types of cool video games are made, and some of the best type of technology has been invented in Japan.

Karl Marx and the Industrial Revolution

Karl Marx was a 19th century Philosopher, Political economist, and a revolutionary.

Simon Bolivar and Latin American Revolutions

Simon Bolivar is a very important person in the history of South America. He has accomplished many things or goals in his life. One of his major accomplishments was that he is regarded as one of the liberators of South America. He is so famous because he has won independence for many South American Countries. He is like George Washington of South America. One of the founding fathers. He had a very good childhood because he was born in a wealthy family. His parents died when he was just a teenager but his still recieved a very good education.
He traveled to Europe in 1804. In Europe he learned about the enlightment ideas and about a free countries. When he was coming back from Europe he came through United States and found out that people governed themselfs. He returned to his country in 1808. All the things he learned outside his country were influences of the Latin American Revoluton.
Bolivar was a great revolutionary leader and never gave up. He continued to fight for the independence for his and other latin countries. Finally he was able to gain independence for his country and was aa hero of Latin America now known as South America

Nationalism & The Creation Of Italy

I think that nationalism are countries who have broken up from a larger country and have mad their own country / Nation. I am a Nationalistic because I live in a country which is not ruled by another empire or another country. The country I live in has its own law, currency, flag, we have symbols for this country. In this country we all speak a common language, we have a history for this country. Most of the people in this country follow a certain culture. I do many thing that show i am Nationalistic I follow the culture of the country I live in. I speak the common language of this country. I use the currency of this country, I do the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of this country.
Nationalism was also used to create the nation of Italy. Before a long time ago Italy used to be a part of the Austria-Hungary empire. But when other countries started to declare independence Italy was very influenced by them. So, when Italy wanted their independence the had a war of independence. They're were riots all over Italy which also triggered many other riots in Europe. They named their nation and slowly broke away from the Austria-Hungary empire. Then they made a flag for their nation was not part of any other nation or empire. So this is how Italy used nationalism to gain independence.

The French Revolution: Social Causes

Causes Of The French Revolution

• Poor Economic Situation

• High Unemployment and high bread prices

• The king at the time of the French Revolution was a weak king.

In France there were 3 different Estates. The people in the first estate were the catholic clergy. They were 1% of the populatioin and owned 10% of the land and payed 2% in Taxes. The people in the second estate were the wealthy nobels. They were 2 % percent of the Population and owned 20% of the land but did not pay any taxes. Everyone else was in the third estate. The people in the third estate were 98% of the population they did own 70% of the land BUT had to pay 50% in taxes. The third estate felt used because they were about 98% of the population of france and they only had one vote in everything. They were also mad that they had to pay so much taxes and food was so expensive. Enlightment thinkers really influenced the french revolution by their thoughts about fair government. July 14th, 1789 was a very important. On that that day an angry french mob stromed into the Bastille. The Bastille was a prison in paris which had less than a dozen prisoners at the time. This was the starting point if the revolution. In October of that same year somewhere about 6,000 parisian women started to roit in paris due to the high bread prices. They were accompanied by a couple of men. Then they broke into the versailles, this is where the king lived. They demanded for the king and the queen to come with them back to paris. Once the king and queen went they never ever returned. A few years after the king and his wife were excuted by a machine and haad their head chopped of.

Evolution Vs. Creation

Evolution and creation is one of the biggest issue that people argue on. The theory of evolution came from a man called Charles Darwin. Darwin learned about or witnessed evolution on the Golapogos island. There are many part of the Golapogos island so when Darwin went to every other island he saw finches on each is lsland had different beaks. Evolution is more of a scientfice belief though creation is more of a relegious beleif. Creation is the belief than god or gods brought the universe into existence. Creationism is not just the belief that god or gods created the universe but also then they (the gods(s)) made many other things such as the creation of animals and mankind.

Scientific Revolution: Scientific Method

The scientfic revolution started in the 1500 when many scientest started to prove that the bible thaught wrong stuff to the people.. The most important part of the scientfic is the scientific method. The scientfic method is a way of proving Scientific theories. The scientific method is made up from four steps observation, analizing, hypothesize, expirement/ testing. scientest sometimes do expierments many times using the scientific method to prove or disaprove a theory or result.