History of the Ancient World - #5

[abe-no-seimei.livejournal.com]

History of the Ancient World
Thursday 12:30-3:30 pm

Seimei strolled in, sipping from his tea. At his desk, he assembled his scroll for the class discussion.

Discussion question:

Authorities do not all agree about the definition of civilization. Most accept the view that "a civilization is a culture which has attained a degree of complexity usually characterized by urban life." In other words, a civilization is a culture capable of sustaining a substantial number of specialists to cope with the economic, social, political, and religious needs of a populous society.

Discuss (in broad terms) some of the characteristics usually present in a civilization.

"You may also use this class time to work and research on the essay question due next Thursday."

Comments

[soniabelmont.livejournal.com]

Vell, I suppose there's alvays some sort of ruling or governing body- but even zis can vary greatly between different civilizations. Um. That is, you have the pre-Renaissance idea of a civilization, vhere a king or noble has superior rule, vith some lower class of nobility falling underneath them and who are responsible for smaller sections of that state. Serfs and slaves vurk the land, vhile boyars nobility have the job of protecting the vurking class. There is really no concept of a middle class.

However, if vun looks forward not a hundred years, ve can see zis concept changing rapidly. As countries become vealthy, and farming technology improves, less people are needed to vurk the land. As such, ve see a rise in the number of skilled tradesmen and academics, who can now afford to do something *besides* farm vithout vurrying about starving. Now ve are in the Renaissance, a period vhen ideas about civilization, society, and people as individuals vill begin to change qvite drastically.

Erm...I hope zat's something along the lines of an appropriate answer.

((OOC: I don't even know if that makes sense, but i'm studying pre-Renaissance and Reformation Europe, and it at least sounds good enough. :D ))

[abe-no-seimei.livejournal.com]

((ooc: *laugh* It looks good to me. These questions are coming out of the ether so half the time I hope they are sounding at least reasonable.))