Madison Rambles #8: The French Lost the French Revolution
Hello, everyone!
I was going to read farther into the text and do the entirety of Chapter 16, but I decided to stop at the beginning of the section "Echos of Revolution" for three reasons:
1. The syllabus stated that I only had to read the Part 5 Intro and the first two sections of Chapter 16.
2. In the same weekend, I had read all of Oedipus Rex. If I read the entire chapter, I would most likely be nearing seventy pages of text that I've read over the weekend.
3. My head was too busy thinking of other things. I read the Simon Forman casebooks from Cambridge, and now my mind is thinking of how people trusted an astrologist doctor with their medical problems.
So instead of trying to focus all of my attention to what I have due on Thursday, I'll just do what's required for Tuesday. The French Revolution is enough historical absurdity for one day, so we have a lot to talk about.
This is the Intro to Part Five and Chapter 16.
The chapter ponders the question: how do you not be Eurocentric in an era that is Eurocentric? Europe did dominate the world, even finding a way to control China, so how did the book solve this issue. Easy: talk about other countries and their relationships to Europe.
But while the chapter talks about the American Revolution and how they became independent of Britain, it also provides a much more absurd side of history: the French Revolution. If you thought the American Revolution was a political change, wait until you hear about what the French Revolution was like.
The French Revolution was basically the French, tired of the inequality, killing King Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette in order to reform French society into a republic. It got to the point where in the first anniversary of their deaths, they burned the crowns and scepters in celebration. It was a true political reform, which is why instead of France having a king today, they have a president.
Haiti also had a revolution and became independent from France. They had a new law that required equality for all, regardless of race or class, and destroyed their plantation market. Ironically, this revolution lead to Napoleon to sell 1/3rd of land to the United States, creating even more slave states in the United States. It shows how even after independence, Haiti was insignificant to the Europeans. It makes the earthquake in 2010 sting even more.
The book also teases the impossible idea of the United States of Latin America. It made me wonder what that hypothetical country would be like. Brazil already has some success in the world, so if the other countries combined into one, we could have a country rivaling the United States, Russia, and China! We would know more about the culture of Latin America, and there would be less poverty in the country. It could be a global superpower!
But alas, the countries fought each other too much, and so we have many separate countries instead of one united nation. That is the way of the Latin American countries.
That was a long one. I heard that we're only supposed to do a page a week, but I think I go overboard by doing more posts. Maybe I get extra credit that way.
Next time, it will be the latter half of the chapter talking about the abolition of slavery. Now we can have even more equality in the world!
Until next time!
I was going to read farther into the text and do the entirety of Chapter 16, but I decided to stop at the beginning of the section "Echos of Revolution" for three reasons:
1. The syllabus stated that I only had to read the Part 5 Intro and the first two sections of Chapter 16.
2. In the same weekend, I had read all of Oedipus Rex. If I read the entire chapter, I would most likely be nearing seventy pages of text that I've read over the weekend.
3. My head was too busy thinking of other things. I read the Simon Forman casebooks from Cambridge, and now my mind is thinking of how people trusted an astrologist doctor with their medical problems.
So instead of trying to focus all of my attention to what I have due on Thursday, I'll just do what's required for Tuesday. The French Revolution is enough historical absurdity for one day, so we have a lot to talk about.
This is the Intro to Part Five and Chapter 16.
The chapter ponders the question: how do you not be Eurocentric in an era that is Eurocentric? Europe did dominate the world, even finding a way to control China, so how did the book solve this issue. Easy: talk about other countries and their relationships to Europe.
But while the chapter talks about the American Revolution and how they became independent of Britain, it also provides a much more absurd side of history: the French Revolution. If you thought the American Revolution was a political change, wait until you hear about what the French Revolution was like.
The French Revolution was basically the French, tired of the inequality, killing King Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette in order to reform French society into a republic. It got to the point where in the first anniversary of their deaths, they burned the crowns and scepters in celebration. It was a true political reform, which is why instead of France having a king today, they have a president.
Haiti also had a revolution and became independent from France. They had a new law that required equality for all, regardless of race or class, and destroyed their plantation market. Ironically, this revolution lead to Napoleon to sell 1/3rd of land to the United States, creating even more slave states in the United States. It shows how even after independence, Haiti was insignificant to the Europeans. It makes the earthquake in 2010 sting even more.
The book also teases the impossible idea of the United States of Latin America. It made me wonder what that hypothetical country would be like. Brazil already has some success in the world, so if the other countries combined into one, we could have a country rivaling the United States, Russia, and China! We would know more about the culture of Latin America, and there would be less poverty in the country. It could be a global superpower!
But alas, the countries fought each other too much, and so we have many separate countries instead of one united nation. That is the way of the Latin American countries.
That was a long one. I heard that we're only supposed to do a page a week, but I think I go overboard by doing more posts. Maybe I get extra credit that way.
Next time, it will be the latter half of the chapter talking about the abolition of slavery. Now we can have even more equality in the world!
Until next time!
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