Boy: Tales of Childhood

Kevin P. McCauley

Final Essay

In the pre-industrialized world, that is any time before the 18th century, there are several common themes that occur all the time. In the industrialized and post-industrialized world, these same themes appear, but in different looks and different ways. The common themes are politics, modernity, globalization, socio-economic organization, and culture. Other kinds of themes are society and religion as well. These themes played out all differently in their own ways between the years 1500 and the present time.

Globalization is one theme that has been appearing for a long time in the world. The definition of globalization is the growth to a global or worldwide scale. The term globalization has been used in some literature to describe a process, a condition, a system, a force, and an age. Given that these completing labels have very different meanings, their indiscriminate usage is often obscure and invites a lot of confusion. To me, a good meaning of globalization is a movement towards greater interdependence and combing to make full completeness, such as integration.

Globalization has played a tough role in the twentieth and the twenty-first century. As globalization fosters human rights, environmental and labor standards, and women's rights across the globe, they also "pose massive problems for the political organization that many had expected to emerge triumphant once empires had dissolved" (Worlds Together, Worlds Apart by Tignor, et.al. Page 454). A good example of this would be the nation-state. It has played good roles though as well. The World Wide Web is a huge example of globalization. The Internet connects billions of workers, governments, and private associates to a big source of communication. Some people say that all of these new creations and new ways of communication is the phenomenon of globalization.

This is untrue to my opinion. Globalization has been around the world for many years in the past. Trade is a huge example of globalization back in the earlier centuries. Even towards the end of the pre-modern period, the existing global trading network was including many interlocking trade circuits that connected the most populous regions of Eurasia and northeastern Africa.

Society is a theme that plays roles in between 1500 and 2005. Society could be summarized and defined as the totality of social relationships among humans, and a group of humans broadly distinguished from other groups by mutual interests, participation in characteristic relationships, shared institutions, and a common culture. Society in the 1500's was much different than in today's time. In the 16th century, society was more spread out, and somewhat smaller. Today's time, society is everywhere. Colonization, communication, socio-economics, cultures, and religions are themes that all deal with society today. Back then, society was a more crucial theme. Being part of a society was real important. It is observed none of the societies became industrialized and modern over night; it is a long process that takes centuries.

Different societies jump into thresholds in different times, caused by different reasons and conditions, and times. It is important that there is not an exact time to jump one of the steps to the other. It is a progress in the society and when the proper conditions appear, society jumps the following threshold and will never turn back to the previous one. This is an example of a major theme of "modernity" as well as a society.

Modernity, to me, is caused by means of violence. I believe that violence has led to "modernity," although it may not be the best or most humanly act. Violence seems to be what has worked best to achieve true modernity. The definition of modernity is the quality of being current or of the present. What we call "modernism," the self-conscious sense came to prominence in many fields. Some good examples of modernity are architecture, physics, art, music, etc. Architecture has been dramatically changing for many years. Early looks of architecture are much different looking than the present architect work. Music has changed as well as dancing. Even soap, food, and other important essentials we use everyday deal with modernity and is very different from past times.

There were many uncertainties and insecurities in modernism in the 16th century and so on. Egyptian social scientists read the works of European thinkers. At the same time, German and French artists flocked to museums to look at different Egyptian artifacts. They were also looking at different paintings and sculptures that were located in Africa and Asia. All of these countries and continents.

Religion is a common theme that played many roles back in the 16th century and is still being played in the present time. Belief in and reverence for a supernatural power or powers regarded as creator and governor of the universe was what people were doing. Islam is the youngest of the three monotheistic world religions (with Judaism and Christianity). Religion has caused extensive warfare over many years in time. In the 16th Century, a good example of religious warfare is the Protestant