myhistorylogbook

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Loogbook #7

My life and the 4th Industrial Revolution

I am eighteen years old, I was born in the new century, and this is something that I’ve always thought it was very cool. I remember technology as a child and while it was something that I enjoyed a lot and that surprise me in several aspects, I guess I was never amused by it, because through my life it has always existed. It was “normal”. But as I grew up and started to notice the changes, for example the transition from key phones to touch phones, cassettes to dvd’s, video camera to being able to record on your phone, I think those were the moments when I actually realized the power and reach of technology and how fast it was advancing, and when I started wondering, how far could technology go?

I think my life is very different from my parents when they were my age, they didn’t get to experience life as I have until now. There are stories from my dad in which he tells me that he started to study “systems" because it involved computers and that was SO cool and innovative at the time, and stories from my mom in which she tells me that se had to carry her writing machine to school everyday, because that was the way that things were back then. Not only that, but something that comes off as “essential” nowadays (cellphone), didn’t even existed back then, communication as it is was very different for the teen years of the past generation, and I think that’s something very shocking to put in perspective, how much things have changed.

I think that this accelerated development of the technology has made our lives easier in a way, but it has also created new problems by itself. For example a key element in which technology has helped me, and not only me but millions, is in education. The reach you can get with a computer is unimaginable, and personally I feel very grateful because living in this time, having access to internet and a computer, can open really big doors for you, education can be supported by a tool that allows us to know and learn like never before. This online modality of school for example I something that I never really though I would be doing. It is different, it is tired, and sometimes hard to understand, but it is also amazing.

Now speaking of all the different devices at our reach, that’s also something really cool, because before, there were only computers, and then phones, and now there are tablets, kindles, and I suppose many more devices that I don’t even know of. Personally as someone who is into art and drawing, I can make a lot of things on my iPad, and it is my favorite digital  tool to use. 

I am studying architecture, for the future... I see so many bright things, I see a lot of innovation to be made in the field. One of the main aspects that changed the physical world in the 4th industrial revolution is biotechnology. By readjusting the current design process and connecting it with different fields, like biotechnology, I believe that we can create a new era for architecture, in which our main client is nature, and revolutionize the way that we had been constructing until now.

[myhistorylogbook]

Logbook #6

The XXIst Century Revolutions & Globalization

The industrial revolution has been a very strong topic since it started almost two centuries ago, it’s been under the scrutiny of historians, economist and scientist because being such a complex matter, it cant be fully comprehended just by one academic point of view. This period that occurred between 1760-1850 is been key in many aspects to the development of the society and the technological and economic way of life that is happening today.

But today we will be analyzing wether or not the industrial revolution had a positive impact on people lives, specifically talking about poverty. And how did the industrial and communication revolutions influenced globalization and also how did all of these factors helped develop the world we live in today. 

There are many opinions about the economical growth that the industrial revolution brought to them common, working class people. At first thought I would say “yeah it was probably good, they had salaries now”, but gong into it a little bit deeper we discover way more than that. Investigating a little on the topic, I discovered that there is a myth about how the industrial revolution brought squalor and deprivation, this had been propagated by Friedrich Engels and others who did not agree with the economical model under which the industrial movement was ruled. ok, so this makes some sense. But digging in a little deeper we can put thing into perspective. Before the IR (Industrial Revolution) poor people mostly worked on the land and did a lot of physical labour, they depended on their crops to eat and usually there was malnourishment and low life expectancy. Once the IR started and people moved into towns and started working on factories, mines and foundries, they now had salaries, which in one hand gave them more stability on their finances, because unless they were fired they had an stable income for their families, but in the other hand we know how the relation between wage-salary went. It was mostly not fair. They spend their live working very long hours, sometimes not in the greatest conditions, and other times even the children had to work to level up with the economic demand that living in a city demanded. So, while yes the IR brought stability to the people (now they wouldn’t starve if they had a bad year in the crops), and the life expectancy went up and in theory poverty decreased, we can also weight the consequences that it had on peoples lives.

Following, we can also understand that the industrial revolution was one of the big factors that lead to globalization, and the other one was the communication revolution. Some people think of this as a part of the IR, but the CR (communication revolution) encapsulates quite different matters such as the canal, turnpike, steamboat, railroad, tele-graph, submarine cable, telephone, automobile, wireless telegraph, air- plane, and radio, although the development of these inventions was accelerated by the machine age. The communication revolution was the key element that helped to get globalization the way it is today, with these new transports, carrying merchandise from one place to another was much easier and more effective, and through the media such as radio, making known or announcing events that happen (or even products that are traded) away from their localities was no longer a issue.

So now that we know this, I think that the fact that the IR and CR created first of all a need for workers and therefore a source of jobs was a factor towards development, also the invention of the new ways of transportation was a big development indicator. Globalization created a very competitive market, in which the main seller wins more, so it a factor of development, but at the same time the extra production of some means the decrease of production of other so for them it wasn’t promoting development. A other facto to look at is the way that people were living, because development not only means economic or industrial, but in the social matter is where I think that there were more needs to be covered and development to be achieved.

Sources:

Pirie, Madsen. “Economic Nonsense: 17. The Industrial Revolution Brought Squalor and Impoverished the Poor.” Adam Smith Institute, Adam Smith Institute, 3 Mar. 2015, www.adamsmith.org/blog/economics/economic-nonsense-17-the-industrial-revolution-brought-squalor-and-impoverished-the-poor.

Majewski, John. “How the Industrial Revolution Raised the Quality of Life for Workers and Their Families: John Majewski.” Foundation for Economic Education, Foundation for Economic Education, 1 July 1986, fee.org/articles/the-industrial-revolution-working-class-poverty-or-prosperity/.

Albion, Robert G. “The ‘Communication Revolution.’” The American Historical Review, vol. 37, no. 3, July 1932.

Monge, Yolanda. “La Gran Revolución Del Siglo XX.” EL PAÍS, 29 Aug. 2007, elpais.com/diario/2007/08/30/revistaverano/1188424801_850215.html.

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Logbook #5

Modern Construction of the XXth Century

The XXth century was a very crowded one in terms of historical and memorable events, there was a bit of everything, from pandemics, to wars, to nuclear weapons and space exploration and also the digital revolution. All these events shaped the world that we know today, but not everything in a positive way. 

Never the less there was something that even if it was changing constantly, it never stopped occurring. There was always someone In power, maybe not just one, and we are talking about the countries great powers.

At the beginning of the XXth century the most influential countries were France, Great Britain, the Austrian Empire, Germany, the Italian Empire, Japan and Russia, as the years went by after the WWI we can also add United States and China to this list, this countries were called the great powers because they had (some of them still) a great influence in the economic, military field.

Talking specifically about the great powers before WWI we can identify that they were all placed in Europe and only two of them in Asia, as we know Europe had always been the center of the important things (or at least the ones that we have registered as “world history”) that happened in the ancient world, so the great powers being mostly placed in Europe comes in no surprise. After WWI we have United States and China joining the great powers, and United States becomes the first and only American country to be a great power.

The changes that happened towards 1945 were that Germany, Austria, Italy and Japan were no longer powers, but still the rest of the countries had a big influence and importance. But after the end of WWII something big happened, the word became polarized and something called the “Iron Curtain” happened. This was because now, The Soviet Union and The United States became not only potencies but super potencies and the rest pf the countries were either on one side or the other, meaning they were either communist or capitalist.  But this country weren’t always opposed, in WWII they fought together to defeat the nazi Germany and the Japanese Empire. But problems over the German territory is what caused this two countries to star what we call “The cold war”. 

The cold war was a period of many changes, discoveries and struggles, it involved a lot of geopolitical tensions because the two countries fought over the influence in the world. This also meant that any sort of communist idea was absolutely banned from American land and they even used the media like Hollywood movies to make propaganda against communism (it was disguised as a lovely movie with “bad” Russian people), and in the same manner, no capitalist way of mind was allowed nowhere near The Soviet Union or the countries allied to it.

So putting everything in perspective there was a big difference in the power holders between the period of 1900-1945 and 1945 forward, because for the first time the greatest power wasn’t in Europe, and that had been that way for all the time prior to 1945, and also never before the world had been so polarized between to ways of political and economic organization, a clear example of how divided was the world is the Berlin Wall, that literally divided a whole country in two.

Sources:

Wikipedia contributors. (2020b, 22 marzo). Wikimedia list article. Recuperado 31 marzo, 2020, de https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_modern_great_powers

Wikipedia contributors. (2020a, 29 marzo). XXth century. Recuperado 31 marzo, 2020, de https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/20th_century

https://youtu.be/dsDrYh2Af5Y

[myhistorylogbook]

Logbook #4

Patriarchal structures

First of all I want to start this week’s blog by giving some super easy definitions so that we can get in context about the discussed theme.

Patriarchy: It refers to any form of social organization whose authority is reserved exclusively for men.

Structure: The way the parts of a whole are organized or ordered.

Hegemony: Domain and control of an entity over others of the same type.

Masculinity: It is the set of characteristics that society imposes that supposedly define the way men should be.

Machismo: Is an ideology that encompasses the set of attitudes, behaviors, social practices and beliefs aimed to promote the superiority of men over women.

Feminism: is a group of political, cultural, economic and social movements that aims to search for equal rights between men and women, and to eliminate the domination and violence of men over women.

Now that we can see these definitions we can easily see the differences and similarities between one and other, with this information we can reaffirm that, for example feminism and machismo aren’t actually synonyms but in opposite genders, and we can also understand a little better what’s the actual meaning of an hegemonic masculinity; it literally means that society imposes that men (some specific characteristics kind of men) should have control over other entity of the same type (meaning women). But keeping it just like that, it is normal if we think “but that’s just a concept why would society would impose a crazy thing like that”, and that is exactly were the concept of structure fits. According to history, it’s been a really long long time since we have been ruled by a patriarchal structure. In a literal meaning it is “the rule of the fathers” but this has actually been used to name a type of organization in which authority is ejerced by men, so it’s not that patriarchy is evil, it’s just the way thing are organized (for now), also in a way patriarchy and hegemonic masculinity have kind of a reciprocate relationship, in patriarchal system hegemonic masculinity is the only time of masculinity considered as “valid” and hegemonic masculinity is what keeps patriarchy alive.

“The socialization process of men is built on the certainty that their sex gives them the right to dispose of their surroundings, the space and time of others and, first of all, others. This right also extends to the body and sexuality of women. From there there is only one step to that, in the case of a right, it is legitimate to achieve and preserve it, even if it is with violence"(Szil, 2014:9). I find this quote really interesting because it explains very well how is it that even when in theory a patriarchal structure is not equal to violence why is it that there’s so much of it. It’s the superiority feel, that’s what gives men the “right” to do whatever they want with others specially women.

And I think it is so important that as a society we reflect and analyze these concepts and the way they relate with each other, but coming from a place of empathy, because if we intend to make a change in women’s life we need to fully understand what are the standards that we’ve lived all our lives under and what can we do to break them. 

Talking a little bit about the reading, it was such an interesting point of view, because the author tells us there is so much already about wars and heroes and important peoples achievements (important men), that we left behind the memories and the little simple things that build our lives, no one ever talks about the war that women fight everyday because we’re not used to even picture it in words, we’ve been taught to keep this wars only in our minds because it is not okay to bring them to “reality”, even when they have already occurred in reality to most of us. That’s why I think that now a days is so important to support the women that dare to speak up and stop filing all these wars on their minds and hearts, the women that dare to fight  in the most simple but significative way that is not leaving things to live forever only in our minds.

Based on: 

RANEA TRIVIÑO, B. (2015). Analizando la demanda: relación entre masculinidad hegemónica y prostitución femenina. Recuperado de file:///Users/guse/Downloads/50746-Texto%20del%20art%C3%ADculo-106012-1-10-20161222.pdf

Schongut Grollmus, N. (2011b). La construcción social de la masculinidad: poder, hegemonía y violencia. Recuperado de http://repositorio.ugm.cl/bitstream/handle/12345/634/La%20construcci%c3%b3n%20social%20de%20la%20masculinidad.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y

https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hegemon%C3%ADa

https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriarcado

https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feminismo

http://www.mujeresenred.net/spip.php?article1396

[myhistorylogbook]

Logbook #3

Relation between the Roaring 20s, the Great Depression and the Great Recession.

The Roaring 20s refers to the period of time in the decade of 1920 in the United States, it acquired this particular name because people identify this decade as a period of collective happiness, craziness, freedom, and economic expansion and prosperity. Economy growth was bigger and faster than ever before, and people believed (they were actually pretty convinced) it would continue to be this way for a long, long time, and this was also a reason of why folks started to be a little reckless in the way they spend their money. But that’s not entire their fault, because in the 20´s there were this social parameters all around people that tell them how they should be living and what material stuff they should have, stuff that in the past was complete luxury and out of picture, but now they could actually afford, so, why not?

This specific decade in time is kind of know by people now a days (we at least have heard something about it) because some of the principal characteristics that defines it and that have become pretty famous like, jazz, women right to vote and work, illegal boost and gangster movies.

On the other hand, The Great Depression was the biggest known economic crisis (to this moment) and it started in 1929 on the unfaithful day better known as “Black Tuesday”. This depression affected not only the States, but it also expanded to the rest of the world. Some characteristics of this period are economic and social difficulties that led to big political changes around the world like totalitarian governments and a rise in communism, also as the financial system was affected this produced several consequences like disemployment, insecurity, poverty, famine. So how come the Roaring 20s being all prosperous relate to this depression that brought a really HARD time for people around the globe?

Well the link begins with WWI, this war brought different economic consequences to the countries. Europe was pretty much submerged in debt and inflation, but on the other hand United States was left with a big impulse in the industrial and economic field. But it was exactly this accelerated growth and the excessive use of credit that created a transformation in their economy and eventually led them to the breaking point. So with America’s economy down and pretty much the rest of the world’s economy also down, everything was all messed up.

The Great Recession is a term used to define an economic decline that occurred around 2007, the characteristics os the recession is that there was a really slow economic activity, meaning that there also was a slow demand, because people didn’t have a lot of money or because they were trying to save for the uncertain future. There is probably a biggest relation than what im about to point out, but I think one of the principal similarities between the Great Depression and the Great Recession is that they both started in United States, but this country having such a big influence in other countries economies, it obviously expanded into reaching a global level. But the difference is that now having this antecedent of the Great Depression, the designated people in charge of the economic and politic field have somehow “learned”, and even though this recession also represented a tough moment in economy it managed to not reach the level of a depression and I believe this has to do with the fact that the history served as an example of how to improve, even when everything is going wrong.

Based on:

La gran depresión. Recuperado de Enciclopedia de Historia (https://enciclopediadehistoria.com/la-gran-depresion/).

Essays, UK. (November 2018). Characteristics Of Recession And Financial Crisis Economics Essay. Retrieved from https://www.ukessays.com/essays/economics/characteristics-of-recession-and-financial-crisis-economics-essay.php?vref=1

Temin, P. (s.f.). The Great Recession & the Great Depression [Daedalus, Vol. 139, No. 4, on the financial crisis & economic policy (Fall 2010), pp. 115- 124]. 

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Logbook #2

REFLECTION ABOUT WWI AND THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION

World War I and the Russian Revolution, as one of the major events that took place in the past century, have a strong influence on the world being such as we now it nowadays.

They both developed simultaneously. World War I lasted from 1914 to 1918, and the Russian Revolution started in 1917.

The previous years before WWI started, there were a high number of findings and great advances in a lot of different fields, such as technology, medicine, food industry, and of course, military. It has been said that, with the progress of science the man will face its own destiny, to be touched and judged by the things he has done. I believe that. At the time, people used to say that wars would be quicker and even so, that they would be less frequent. Of course they were wrong, and WWI is just an example of that, if we want to answer ourselves the question “Is human development the cure to our problems?”, we just need to put an eye back to the XX century and it´ll just pop inside of our heads. Is not. Contrarily to that, it seems that the more advanced the human turns, the more dangerous he becomes, for himself, for others, and for the mere planet.

WWI was a butchery, it took away approximately 40 million lives, between military and civilian casualties. The conflict had two main sides: The Central Powers, composed of Germany, Turkey, Austria-Hungary, among others, and the Allies, which included mainly France, Great Britain, Russia, Italy, Japan, and the United States (since 1917). The Allies won the war.

During the conflict, Russia had his own internal problems. Tsar Nicholas II was at the front, so his spouse, the Empress Alexandra, was in charge to rule the nation while he wasn´t available. Unfortunately, Empress Alexandra´s government was highly incompetent, and the tension kept growing inside of the Russian civilians, who demanded an end for the war, led to abdication of Tsar Nicholas II and the posterior rise to power of Vladimir Lenin, who guided the nation to transform into a communist model, product of the “brotherhood” and change the Russians hoped for. This is extremely important, because it was the first time a country turned itself into a socialistic form of government. This series of events result interesting if we think of it as if it occurred in the actual world. A tired country, with a common interest, had the power to create enough chaos and pressure to dissolve a government. All that in search of a greater good, of something that could link every citizen, bond them, inspire them. I question myself, is it possible such a thing nowadays? Are we strong enough as a nation, as a team, as Mexicans? If we all shared one vision, what could we accomplish?

Well, it is important to state that socialism didn´t work that long for the Russian people, but as it did, the URSS turned into one of the most powerful nations on the planet.

Knowing about these events is crucial, not only to learn of the mistakes of the past so that we don´t commit them again, but also to think more critically, to compare, to explore, Why? Because it isn´t enough only to know the facts, the told story, no. It is highly important to recognize the background, to analyze, to think as if you were part of something similar, because we are. Every single event that occurred in the past conducted us to the world we have today. And we´re part of history right now, we´re still dealing with our wars, not just between nations, but against violence, injustice, abuse, corruption. We continue fighting, conscious or not about it.

The decline of humanity, the search for power, the need to have something the identify with, are interesting aspects to think about. These were some of the things that could describe WWI and the Russian Revolution, and also, our XXI century world.

It takes importance also if I see it form another perspective, my career election. Why? Because it is the power I´m looking for, it fulfills my desires, makes me feel powerful to think of myself as an architect, it also gives me the freedom I need, to open my mind to a garden where it can play, where I can design my own little worlds, the way I see them, and it gives me something to identify with, to belong to. And I want to belong here.

[myhistorylogbook]

Logbook #1

Why History?

This week we started our  course “Historical milestones of 20th and 21st centuries”, at the beginning I must say I didn’t know how to feel about it because I usually “don’t like history”, but as the class went by I was amused because in such a short period of time I rediscover (because I kind of already knew, but not quite) the real meaning of why it is important to study all these things that have happened before us and how they really have shaped the world we now live on.

In class today we learned about how we are use to live in a westernized society, in which (among other characteristics), its why in our previous world history classes we  were only taught about certain type of events (mostly European, white, christian and male based stuff), and thinking a little bit deeper about that I got caught in the thought of “What led the world to be this way? There must have been some really important key events that somehow made this all happen”. And of course there are, I will list below some of the most important ones for me.

The life of Jesus: this is single handedly one of the most important, known and impactful historical milestone ever, it impacts even the life of the people who don’t believe in it and the biggest example we can make about it is our dating system.

The impact of christianity: in relation to the previous one, the impact of christianity in our world has been huge, many good and bad historical events have to do with this religion, there’s been love and charity because of it but also hate and violet movements, I personally think that even if nowadays we have more freedom to decide what religion we want to be part of, or if we don’t want to be part of any of them, christianity (catholicism) is still very strong and very much present in our everyday lives.

Colonization: This event is also a very important one, and by very important I mean REALLY important. Colonization is present in our lives every day, because, colonization is in a way what “developed” so many countries into what they are today. I don’t mean that necessarily as a good thing nor a bad one, simply as a truth.

I believe that by investigating and understanding a little bit more of these and many other milestones we really do get a different and new perspective on present and past events in life and we even dare to imagine how things will go in the future, and I think this is the very purpose of studying history, give us the tools to comprehension and judgment.