Exam Study Notes

Islam

  • Shi’a/Sunni split: Two major groups within Islam.
  • Five Pillars of Islam:
    • Allah is God.
    • Pilgrimage to Mecca.
    • Pray.
    • Donate to charity.
    • Fasting.

Mongols

  • Genghis Khan: One of the greatest military leaders, never lost a battle, killed 14 million people, created the largest land empire in history.

Magna Carta

  • Signed by King John I, limited the power of kings by preventing them from seizing property or randomly raising taxes.

Black Death/Plague

  • Bubonic plague, spread by fleas on rats, inspired art focused on death.

Gutenberg

  • Invented the printing press to make the Bible more accessible.

Machiavelli

  • Wrote a guide for rulers, stating that humans are inherently evil, so strict order is necessary, and the ends justify the means.

More

  • Wrote "Utopia," advocating for:
    • Freedom of religion.
    • 10-hour work day.
    • Sharing everything.
    • Good treatment of criminals.

Renaissance Artists

  • Michelangelo:
    • David
    • Sistine Chapel
  • Raphael:
    • David and Goliath
  • Leonardo da Vinci:
    • Mona Lisa
    • Vitruvian Man
  • Bosch:
    • Garden of Earthly Delights: Showed the concept of inherent human evil.

Age of Exploration

Reformation

  • Martin Luther:
    • Kicked off the Reformation.
    • Made 95 Theses.
    • Indulgences should be abolished.
    • Only the Bible should be taught.
    • Priests should be able to marry.
  • John Calvin:
    • Reformer who led the Reformation in Switzerland.
    • Predestination: Whether someone is to be saved or damned is predetermined.
  • Henry VIII:
    • Had many wives.
    • Caused split from Rome over rights to divorce.
  • Counter-Reformation:
    • Reforms of Catholicism following the Reformation.
    • Attempts to maintain control over the Holy Roman Empire.
  • Ignatius Loyola:
    • Founded the Jesuits.

Middle Passage

  • The journey slaves took from Africa to the Americas.

Scientific Revolution

  • Heliocentric Theory:
    • Developed by Copernicus.
    • Earth goes around the sun.
  • Copernicus:
    • Developed the heliocentric theory.
    • Wasn't a heretic because his writings were only in scholarly Latin.
  • Galileo:
    • Invented the telescope.
    • Proved Copernicus’s theories.
    • Was persecuted by the church because he wrote his findings in Italian so everybody could read it.
  • Newton:
    • Developed the theory of gravity.
    • Also made findings on optics and light and calculus.

Exploration and Colonization

  • Columbus:
    • Discovered the New World.
  • Columbian Exchange:
    • The introduction of new ideas, species, and diseases between the New and Old World.
  • Cortes:
    • Conquered the Aztecs at Teotichitlan.
  • Pizarro:
    • Conquered the Incas.
  • Magellan:
    • Circumnavigated the globe.

Enlightenment

  • Adam Smith:
    • Economist who wrote Wealth of Nations.
    • Main concepts were:
      • Free markets.
      • Invisible hand.
      • Laissez-faire: Hands off, the government should interfere with the economy as little as possible.
  • Voltaire:
    • Philosopher who wrote Candide.
    • Candide Content:
      • Medicine and doctors are bad.
      • War is futile.
      • Slavery is wrong.

Communism

  • No private property or individual wealth; everything should be for the common good.
  • Marx/Engels:
    • Wrote the Communist Manifesto.
  • Bourgeoisie/Proletariat:
    • Bourgeoisie: The rich elites.
    • Proletariat: The workers and laborers.

Nationalism

  • The interests and well-being of the nation as a whole are superior to those of the individuals.

Unification Movements

  • Unification of Germany:
    • Several individual states in central western Europe formed together to create Germany.
    • Bismarck: Unified Germany.
      • Promoted German nationalism.
      • Gave Iron and Blood speech.
      • Fought wars with Austria and France over the unification of the German states.
  • Unification of Italy:
    • Many states in southern Italy unified under Garibaldi.
    • Garibaldi:
      • Leader of the Red Shirts.
      • Unified Italy.
      • Promoted Italian exceptionalism, which led to Mussolini.

Industrial Revolution

  • Europe builds more factories and puts a heavy economic focus on machinery.

Imperialism

World War I

Napoleon

  • French general and eventual emperor of France.
  • Conquered much of Europe during his reign.
  • Invasion of Russia:
    • One of the main reasons Napoleon's empire falls.
    • Scorched earth strategy: Russia burnt down their stuff and ran away so Napoleon ran out of resources and had to retreat.
  • Waterloo:
    • Napoleon’s final defeat.

Social Darwinism

  • The belief that intelligence and morality have evolved and are passed down among certain people groups and races.

Opium War

  • When Britain started a war in China because they were selling Opium.

Scramble for Africa

  • Following the Berlin Conference, many European nations conquered territories in Africa; mostly Britain, Germany, France, and Belgium.
  • White Man's Burden:
    • Poem by Rudyard Kipling.
    • Said white men were civilized, and that it’s their duty to civilize the African people.

Schlieffen Plan

  • Germany planned to quickly conquer France before Russia was prepared for war and then attack Russia.
  • Failed because of the slow trench warfare tactics and resulted in many more German deaths.

Causes of WWI

  • Militarism
  • Alliances
  • Nationalism
  • Imperialism
  • Arms race
  • Desire for independence

League of Nations

  • Formed after WWI in order to prevent future major wars.
  • Was doomed from the start because the US, Germany, and Russia all refused to join.

US Entry into WWI

  • Germany broke the Lusitania agreement.
  • Pearl Harbor

Russian Revolution

  • Lenin: Leader.
    • Leader of the October Revolution.
    • Head of the Bolsheviks.
    • First leader of the USSR.
  • Bolsheviks:
    • Lenin’s political party.
    • Bolsheviks means majority even though Lenin’s group wasn’t the majority.

1930s and WWII

Great Depression

  • Causes of the Great Depression:
    • Margin: People were taking out loans in order to buy stock; This meant people could buy more, which inflated price in the short term.
    • Inequality of wealth
    • US went from debtor to creditor
    • Corporate schemes
    • Stock market boom

Stalin

  • Dictator of the USSR after Lenin during WWII.
  • One of the deadliest leaders of all time.
  • Collectivization: When farmers in states such as Ukraine were forced to stop owning individual farms and start working together for all soviets.
  • Great Purge/Terror Famine:
    • The Holodomor was a mass famine made by Stalin in Ukraine.
    • Ukrainians were given unreasonably high grain quotas.

Hitler

  • Dictator of Nazi Germany during WWII.
  • Rise to power:
    • Germany was mad because of the Treaty of Versailles.
    • People hated the government.
    • He became temporary dictator but then never let go of his power.
  • Holocaust: The genocide of the Jews.
  • Appeasement: Giving Germany whatever they ask for in attempt to avoid war.
  • Operation Barbarossa: The invasion of USSR and violation of Non-Aggression.

WWII Leaders

  • Churchill: Leader of the UK during WWII.

Pearl Harbor

  • When the Japanese bombed a US naval base.

D-Day

  • The day the allies stormed the beach of Normandy.

Post WWII

Cold War

  • USA and USSR fighting over capitalism and communism.
    • Containment: Keeping communism from spreading.
    • Domino Theory: If one country becomes communist, the countries surrounding it will as well.
    • MAD: Mutually Assured Destruction.
      • Everyone has the power to obliterate each other with nukes so no one uses nukes.
  • Fall of Communism/USSR:
    • Gorbachev attempted to rule softly and not force anyone to be communist, eventually the USSR dissolved because of this.

Post Colonialism

  • Decolonization Theories:
    • Nationalist: The natives rebelled.
    • International: People don’t like imperialism.
    • Metropolitan/Domestic: It wasn't worth the time or resources to colonize.
  • Africa:
    • Biafra
    • Nigerian civil war
    • Rwandan genocide:
      • Hutus killed the Tutsi.
      • Most preventable genocide because they used weapons like machetes.
      • Hutu/Tutsi: The main ethnic groups in Rwanda.
  • India:
    • Nehru: First Prime Minister of India after independence.
  • Pakistan:
    • Jinnah: First leader of Pakistan after independence.
  • Creation of Bangladesh:
    • East and West Pakistan had a civil war, East won its independence and became Bangladesh, and South became Pakistan.
  • China:
    • Chiang Kai-Shek: Last leader of the Chinese republic, Ruled during WW2 but was shortly afterwards overthrown by Mao.
    • Mao Zedong: Dictator of China following revolution
      • Great Leap Forward: Forced industrialization of China, Resulted in mass starvation
      • Cultural Revolution: When Mao attempted to make everyone a good communist, People went as far as turning each other in and eating each other.
    • Deng Xiaoping: Capitalist economy, Communist government.
  • Pol Pot/Khmer Rouge
    • Pol Pot was the dictator of Cambodia, he committed a genocide killing smart people and anyone who didn't agree with him, and made everyone a peasant farmer

Philosophies/Art

  • Abstract art
  • Communism:
    • No private property or individual wealth
    • Everything should be for the common good
  • Cynicism: People should live to their natural needs, making cannibalism, incest, and public urination okay.
  • Dada
  • Existentialism:
    • Everything thing is pointless and has no meaning
    • There are positive and negative outlooks on existentialism
  • Freudian Psychology:
    • Id is the selfish part of your brain.
    • Ego is the balanced part of you brain.
    • Superego is the selfless part of you brain.
  • Laissez-faire: The government shouldn’t interfere with the economy, hands off.
  • Liberalism (18th century version, not modern)
  • Malthusian Demographics:
    • Graph of population
    • We will eventually run out of resources for the human population, leading to a steep decline in population
  • Pop Art:
    • Andy Warhol, make low culture things high quality
  • Realism: Art that depicts things as realistic as possible
  • Renaissance Art
  • Romanticism: Art that glorifies war, death, or big things happening
  • Skepticism & Daoism:
    • Skepticism is doubting everything
    • Daoism means the way, which is following the natural order of the universe
  • Sociobiology: Emotions evolved just like physical features