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Literature Review of cultural diversity
Literature Review of cultural diversity
Introduction on culture and diversity
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Geographical location affects on ancient civilizations is one of the main factors in their development. Several different factors are responsible for the evolutionary divergence of ancient civilizations, but none so impactful as the circumstances of geographical location, and that which causes divergences in culture. Such examples include climate change, migration, and technological advancement. The Earth goes through many periods of warming and cooling, but for ancient civilizations, it is the beginning of a new civilization and variation in culture. Specifically, the Old Kingdom of ancient Egypt, evidence for its demise is evident in the earth. The civilization fell due to a period of vast warming and drying of the earth, a practice that left the Egyptians without water and reasons to move closer to the Nile River Valley (Tignor p. 85). Ancient Mesopotamia and Indus Valley suffered from the climate trend of 2200 and 2150 BCE, the monsoon rains did not arrive leaving the lands bereft and the people without food. These climate change instigators of migration cause the original civilizations to dissipate, leaving the strongest to survive, as well as separating different groups of the party is …show more content…
Environment changes spurred humans to survive or die, managing to adjust to the drier conditions or to migrate into higher river valleys (Tignor p. 86). Accompanying this ideology, the introduction of people into a population grows that community, growing of a community with an increased population is a rise for a system which helps to administrate the system. “The rise of new, larger, and expansionist territorial states from pharaonic Egypt and Mesopotamia.” (Tignor p. 86) The innovations of the migrants and the rulers in state building enable the people to rebuild a community with the damaged geographical
During the years of 3500 BC to 2500 BC, the geography of a land often impacted a civilizations development in great measures. Depending on the resources available or the detriments present due to certain topographical characteristics like rivers or deserts, a civilization could flourish or collapse. By studying the geographic features of growing societies like the Nile, Euphrates, and Tigris Rivers as well as the Mediterranean Sea of Egypt and Mesopotamia, the link between developing cultures and geography will be examined through sources, including Egypt: Ancient Culture, Modern Land edited by Jaromir Malek and Babylon: Mesopotamia and the Birth of Civilization by Paul Kriwaczek. To determine the extent of its influence, this investigation will attempt to compare and contrast the role of geography in ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, focusing on the civilizations’ various periods of development and settlement.
Geography plays an important role in the development of a civilization. The impact of geography can either make or break a civilization. Early civilizations inhabited features such as river valleys, deserts, rainforests, plateaus and other geographical structures. One important geographically defining structure are river valleys . River valleys had a significant impact on one particular civilization, Mesopotamia.
The ancient civilizations of Mesopotamia and Egypt began to develop circa 3,000 B.C. Located near rivers, the lands offered fertile soil and an excess of crops that drew in many people. As more people arrived, the small settlements flourished into large, thriving civilizations. Many aspects of Mesopotamia and Egypt, such as their cities, their strongly organized government, and their religion, greatly contributed to the success of these two civilizations.
Before the beginning of history, people from across the land gradually developed numerous cultures, each unique in some ways while at the same time having features in common. Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greece and Israel are all important to the history of the world because of religious, social, political and economic development. In the first civilization, both Mesopotamia and Egypt relied on a hunter-gatherer economic system, during that time, every country in the world strived on it. Mesopotamia has rich soil for agriculture, but experiences floods. For the Mesopotamians, these floods would destroy major cities, but for the Egyptians it would keep the soil rich all year long without the damage that the Mesopotamians had experienced.
The ancient civilizations were different compared to the Europeans. There were many tribes such as the Mayans, Aztec, and the Incas. In addition, the ancient civilizations dressed differently by wearing fur and often times cool clothing depending on the weather. Europeans dressed in a full body clothing unlike the ancient civilizations. Many ancient civilizations had their cultures and beliefs. For example, the Aztecs followed the legend that whoever an eagle eating a snake on top of a cactus was; that would be their new home. Unlike Europeans, where ever there was rich agriculture and a vivid future; that was their go to plac...
The Nile and Indus River Valley civilizations were both unique civilizations in their own way in comparison. Yet despite being separated by thousands of miles there are similarities in these two ancient civilizations. It is seen that amongst ancient civilizations, rivers are fundamental for them to prosper and provide for a relatively stable society for which a people can grow and develop. There are general similarities with pinpoint differences as well as general differences with pinpoint similarities. Both civilizations have left their influence on human civilization and history, with their unique characteristics of their religion, way of life, social classes, cultures, technological advancements, government systems, rulers and notable
Around 3500 B.C.E to 3000 B.C.E., civilizations emerged in many places. Egypt and Mesoamerica are distinctive two of them. Considering the different aspects of civilization, historians can find some same characteristics and differences which are valuable for historians to understand civilization in-depth.
The collapse of a complex society is the resultant force of rapid simplification (Tainter, 1990). Whether intrinsically or extrinsically inflicted, exploitation of the very factors with which societal complexity is achieved may initiate the collapse of a civilization (Tainter, 1990). A total of six factors signal the attainment of societal complexity (i.e., urbanization, complex economy, scientific enhancement, public architecture, state religion, and social organization). The collapse of the Inca Empire stood as an example of both intrinsically and extrinsically derived simplification of its complex society. Intrinsically, many of the factors that built societal complexity were poorly establish, predisposing
Two of the earliest and greatest civilizations, Mesopotamia and Egypt, show the transition from a Paleolithic society into a settled civilization. Both cultures had established kings; however, the Pharaoh is the god-king of Egypt, while in Mesopotamia the monarchs are priest-kings whom serve the gods. Although Mesopotamia and Egypt have some characteristics in common, which bring them under the “First Civilizations” category, their different views and beliefs about divine authority and how it is practiced set these civilizations apart and make them unique.
Fruitful climate conditions fostered great civilizations in the past, the Nile river in Egypt or the Tigris and Euphrates in Mesopotamia are examples of that. Catastrophic climate events have also brought civilizations to their knees in the case of Aksum drought or the Nabataeans who fell victim to massive earthquakes. These are only small events compared to Ice Ages and asteroidal impacts that threaten human existence and the wiping of the historical slate. On a smaller scale, a connection has been shown to exist between political and interpersonal violence with climate change. Edward Miguel quantified climate influence on human conflict showing that for every standard deviation increase in temperature “the frequency of interpersonal violence rises 4% and the frequency of intergroup conflict rises 14%” (reference). Political intergroup conflicts are more often than not the end of great civilizations such as the Assyrians, Khmer empire, or the Sumerians. Political peace is a factor often necessary for the development of a modern society Singer never mentions. It becomes more difficult to advance when the best brains of the world are left open on the battlefield. Just like our planet lies in some Goldilocks zone of just right conditions, so does our ecological and political
In ancient civilizations, geography affected them in so many ways, like the climate, resources, and the landscape that they use. The climates affect them because monsoons were offend common that brought heavy rain and wind to the area. The mountains provided them with protection against invasions, but the mountains were also used for trading with other to get the resources that they needed.
Abounding similarities exist between the Mesopotamian and Greek societies. As history progresses many cultural advances occur, but societies also adopt some of the same characteristics as preceding societies, you will notice this between the Mesopotamian and Greek civilizations. After learning about the Greek civilizations I immediately began generating connections to Mesopotamian societies. I noticed similarities in all aspects of society, whether it was religion, military, architecture or any other cultural idiosyncrasies.
The State is a relatively recent phenomenon in human history, emerging somewhere between 6000-3500 B.C. (Ember, Ember, Peregrine, 2005.) Thus a critical issue for anthropology must be: what is the state and why and how did it appear? The most widely accepted definition of the state is an organization which attempts to maintain a monopoly on the use of force and violence in a given territorial area (Rothbard, 2009, p. 11). These powers include the ability to collect taxes, draft men for work or war, and direct and enforce laws (Carneiro, 1970). Another way of looking at the state is by distinguishing the way it acquires wealth. According to Franz Oppenheimer, there are two means for acquiring wealth – the political means and the economic means. The state uses the political means which is the “unrequited appropriation of the labor of others”. The economic means is the exchange of one’s own labor for the labor of others, for the satisfaction of needs (Oppenheimer, 1922, p. 30). States are not to be confused with chiefdoms – which is “a society with centralized but not internally specialized authority” (Spencer, 2010, p. 1). The purpose of this paper is to describe the three frequently discussed theories on the origin of the state: hydraulic theory (irrigation), circumscription, and territory expansion model (local and long-distance trade). I will discuss, critique, and implement all three theories in my own view of the state.
Egyptians began to settle along the banks of the Nile River, Starting as far north as to the city of Alexandria all the way down south to Aswan. They developed into a well-structured society as Far East to the Red Sea and west to Dakhia, Oasis among many (Figure 1.). The Nile River reached far lending a hand in creating a well-known civilization that consisted of building pyramids and producing crops for their pharaoh. Evolving from hunters and gatherers into agriculturalists throughout history, Egypt has claimed to be one of the earliest and most spectacular civilizations of ancient times. One could wonder if, what led to the collapse of this great society resulted from the Egyptians interaction with the environment by overusing natural resources, seasonal flooding of the Nile River can play a role, or even worse feuding wars of rulers that see value in the great Egypt soil that are continuing well into the present day?
The contributions of the civilizations of Mesopotamia in the Fertile Crescent, classical China, ancient Greece, and the Roman Empire laid the foundations for living in the modern world. Breakthroughs in a multitude of fields, including art, architecture, math, science, philosophy, law, government and others are crucial to the way people live all over the world. Although these ancient civilizations may seem primitive today, they shaped the progress of the world for many centuries.