Plans for the Week of Feb. 7

 

  1. You will finish the Renaissance activity- CSI Florence in class on Monday.
  2. Tuesday- we will talk a bit more about Reformation- and consider for a few minutes what you would most want to Protest and Reform.
  3. Tuesday- Thursday- This project will be both an in-school and at-home project. You will examine the Harlem Renaissance. I will give a mini-lecture on Tuesday about the Harlem Renaissance. On Wednesday and Thursday, you will work to make a monument about this person or people.

     

    If you couldn’t tell, I am amazed by Florence. I’ve been lucky enough to visit it twice. It’s beautiful, the art, food, and music are amazing. It really dazzles. I just can’t believe how many important things happened in this relatively small place.

Here’s a short small glimpse of the place and some of its people.

A Universal Man

In the Renaissance, the ideal of the Uomo Universale, the universal man was developed. As Alberti said, “a man can do all things if he will.” The ideal embodied the basics of humanism, which considered man to be the center of the universe with unlimited possibilities for development. They believed that men should try to embrace all knowledge and develop their own abilities as much as possible.

They also could be rather … well, full of themselves

 

Your task.

Write three to six sentences about yourself in the style of Alberti. For inspiration, here is one from me

Alex lifted the goals and aspirations of all of his students, awakening in all of them a love of history.  When he had begun to mature in years, he devoted himself entirely to the study of education and spent years in labor learning technology and educational philosophies. He was extraordinarily modest, indeed he was the least conceited man he had ever met. By some defect in his nature, he loathed smooth jazz, beets and golf.

 

Please post yours in a comment below.

Note: about my use of the word “man”. These men were shaped by the sexism of their day. It wasn’t until quite, quite recently that we began saying “humanity” as opposed to “mankind”. I use “man” because it is how Alberti would have thought.

 

 

 

Nov. 2

This is the written examination of Mary How, condemned and killed for witchcraft in 1682.

Here’s the first paragraph. See what you can make out in the original. You’ll have to zoom in.

The examination of Eliz: How. 31. May. 1692

Mercy Lewis & Mary Walcot fell in a fit quickly after the examinant came in Mary Walcot said that this woman the examinant had pincht her & choakt this month. Ann Putman said she had hurt her three times. What say you to this charge? Here are them that charge you with witchcraft It it was the last moment I was to live, God knows I am innocent of any thing in this nature Did not you take notice that now when you lookt upon Mercy Lewis she was struck [down?] I cannot help it. You are charged here; what doe you say? I am innocent of any thing of this nature. Is this the first time that ever you were accused? Yes S’r. Do not you know that one at Ipswitch hath accused you? This is the first time that ever I heard of it You say that you never heard of these folks before

 

Lesson- People from the past are a different culture than us. They fundamentally thought differently.

Lesson- People look for scapegoats when they are scared.

Lesson- In times of cultural change, sometimes people become very scared and thus people look for scapegoats.

Question- Why did a society that gave women and children no power, believe these girls? What was going on?

 

Remember, witchcraft as defined by the people of Massachusetts 330 years ago was very different from the religion of Wicca, the religion of witches today.

People at the time defined witchcraft as the use of supernatural means to cause harm. And they put the Devil behind it; witches were seen as his followers. Wicca (today) is almost the opposite: a supernatural force for good in the lives of its believers.

As we continue to think about how people thought differently and look at Salem, I want you to think about how this relates to today? Because while we may not believe that witches are everywhere, our society is very quick to embrace conspiracy theories. We believe the outlandish.  Perhaps some of you have heard of the Qanon believers. There are hundreds of thousands of them.  I think one lesson I want you to know is that in uncertain times, people want a scapegoat. And historically speaking, in 1692 Salem was facing very uncertain times.

On a different note entirely, I was very much inspired by these thoughts from WNBA star, Candace Parker the other week when her team won the WNBA championships. Great advice to live by.

 

Arjuna’s Dilemma- Discussion

Today is Monday, Oct. 4.

Remember to take the Asia Map quiz and submit a 95% or better by the end of this week.

I want to talk a little bit about this today:

We have heard about the “dilemma” that Arjuna faces as he stands with his charioteer Krishna between two armies who are preparing to destroy each other. Should he fight in a battle that will lead to the destruction of his friends and family, or should he drop his bow and withdraw from the battle? What is Arjuna’s dharma? What is the “right” thing for him to do?

Have you ever faced such a dilemma? Where the right thing was going to cause pain or hurt or discomfort to yourself or others?

Sports

Image result for is sports a religion

Are Sports a Religion?

read the article above.

Whenever a society (or, here, sports subculture) worships a divine form, it is, in fact, also simultaneously worshipping itself.

the post-game celebration and day-after parades, with its feverish outpouring of emotion—all that hugging and high-fiving, those deafening howls and blubbery weeping—might look like chaotic disorder but it is actually a rare moment of social order: a glimpse of spontaneous solidarity, an interlude of uninhibited integration. This is not to excuse the excess of vandalism or violence that often accompanies the effervescence; the same social norms that maintain chilly anonymity in day-to-day modern life also serve to uphold law and decorum.

It makes a convincing case that sports have replaced religion.

  1. It gives people’s lives meanings
  2. It is tribal.
  3. It has totems and rituals
  4. It has holy objects – like Curt Schillings bloody sock or “holy” fields like Wrigley Field in baseball.

Thursday, Sept 30

Today is the last day of September!

We will continue to talk about religion.

I will want you to take a test this week- more precisely by the end of next week. You have a week to do it. I want you to go to Seterra and take the Asia Map quiz. I will give the first 5 minutes of each class starting today for you to take it.

You need to take it until you have at least a 95%  This is my first attempt and you can see I’d need to take it again. I will ask you to