Chapter 13 + Handout
In the textbook the author asks the readers if Russia should be considered an Asian or European country. My personal opinion is that Russia should be considered Asian. My reasoning behind this is Russia is always fighting against the western part of the world. This divides the globe into an east vs. west rivalry. Another reason is the origin of the country. The country started taking over large amounts of land from many different nomadic tribes in Serbia. These nomadic tribes were very different from the people of Russia. I believe that because a lot of these tribes were absorbed into the Russian society, they were able to change the society into an empire that resembled the rest of Asia.
Another topic during the reading was following a single commodity through out history. This method of watching the economy shows how and when commodities were able to spread through out the globe. Sugar was chosen as the commodity that was followed. During the late medieval period sugar was only available to the high class elite in Europe. Sugar had already been in popular use in the Ottoman Empire. Once Europeans had started creating sugar plantations in the Americas, the availability of the drug sky rocketed. The hard manual labor and high death rate of slaves forced an increase in the use of slaves. The huge demand for sugar was one of the reasons for its huge success as a commodity. Once sugar had spread to the middle class during the eighteenth century, the world had gained a sweet tooth that cemented sugar as a necessary commodity.