scholarly journals Why Europe and the West? Why Not China?

2006 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 3-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
David S Landes

In the history of technological development, why didn't other regions keep up with Europe? This is an important question, as one learns almost as much from failure as from success. The one civilization that was in a position to match and even anticipate the European achievement was China. China had two chances: first, to generate a continuing, self-sustaining process of scientific and technological advance on the basis of its indigenous traditions and achievements; and second, to learn from European science and technology once the foreign “barbarians” entered the Chinese domain in the sixteenth century. China failed both times. What explains the first failure? I stress the role of the market: the fact that enterprise was free in Europe while China lacked a free market and institutionalized property rights; that in Europe innovation worked and paid, while the Chinese state was always stepping in to interfere with private enterprise. As for the second failure, China's cultural triumphalism combined with petty downward tyranny made it a singularly bad learner.

2012 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 47-53
Author(s):  
Edmund Burke

There is something seriously flawed about models of social change that posit the dominant role of in-built civilizational motors. While “the rise of the West” makes great ideology, it is poor history. Like Jared Diamond, I believe that we need to situate the fate of nations in a long-term ecohistorical context. Unlike Diamond, I believe that the ways (and the sequences) in which things happened mattered deeply to what came next. The Mediterranean is a particularly useful case in this light. No longer a center of progress after the sixteenth century, the decline of the Mediterranean is usually ascribed to its inherent cultural deficiencies. While the specific cultural infirmity varies with the historian (amoral familism, patron/clientalism, and religion are some of the favorites) its civilizationalist presuppositions are clear. In this respect the search for “what went wrong” typifies national histories across the region and prefigures the fate of the Third World.


Author(s):  
Rosa Maria Alabrús Iglesias

Resum: En aquest article es fa un estat de la qüestió sobre la història de la Universitats amb un estudi comparatiu de les Universitats de la Corona d’Aragó i, en particular, de les catalanes, amb les Universitats castellanes. S’examina la problemàtica institucional amb les tensions entre l’Església, la Monarquia i els Municipis pel control universitari, la població estudiantil, l’oferta cultural, en les diverses Facultats, l’estructura econòmica, la càrrega docent i la presumpta «revolució educativa» des de la segona meitat de segle xvi. S’analitza, d’altra banda, el període de la decadència final de les Universitats catalanes i la significació de Cervera amb el debat entre jesuïtes i dominics al voltant de la Universitat creada per Felip V i el paper de centres culturals alternatius com l’Acadèmia de Sant Tomàs o l’Acadèmia de Bones Lletres de Barcelona. Paraules clau: Història de les Universitats, problemàtica institucional, càrrega docent, revolució educativa segle xvi, Cervera al segle XVIII Abstract: This article presents a state of the art on the history of Universities with a comparative study of the Universities of the Crown of Aragon and particularly of the Universities of the Crown of Aragon.The institutional problem is examined with the tensions between the Church, the Monarchy and the Municipalities by the university control, the student population, the cultural supply, in the diverse Faculties, the economic structure, the teaching load and the alleged «revolution educational» of the second half of the 16th century. It also analyses the period of the final decay of the Catalan Universities and the significance of Cervera with the debate between Jesuits and Dominicans around the University, create by Philip V, and the role of alternative cultural centres such as the one. Academia de Sant Tomàs or the Academy of Good Letters of Barcelona. Keywords: History of universities, institutional problems, teaching load, educational revolution sixteenth century, Cervera in the 18th century


2021 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 87-105
Author(s):  
Dorota Kozaryn ◽  
Agnieszka Szczaus

The subject of the analysis in the article are the etymological explanations presented in the old non-literary texts (i.e. the texts that function primarily outside literature, serving various practical purposes), i.e. in the sixteenth-century Kronika, to jest historyja świata (Chronicle, that is the history of the entire world) by Marcin Bielski and in two eighteenth-century encyclopaedic texts: Informacyja matematyczna (Mathematical information) by Wojciech Bystrzonowski and Nowe Ateny (New Athens) by Benedykt Chmielowski. The review of the etymological comments allows us to take notice of their considerable substantive and formal diversity. These comments apply to both native and foreign vocabulary. On the one hand, they provide information on the origin of proper names (toponyms and anthroponyms), and on the other hand, a whole range of these etymological comments concern common names. A depth of etymological comments presented in non-literary texts is significantly diversified and independent of the nature of the vocabulary to which these comments apply – they can be merely tips on sources of borrowings of foreign words, but they can also constitute a deeper analysis of the meaning and structure of individual words, both native and foreign. These comments are usually implementations of folk etymology. The role of etymological considerations in former non-literary texts is significant. First of all, these texts have a ludic function, typical of popularised texts – they are supposed to surprise, intrigue and entertain readers. Secondly, they serve a cognitive function typical of non-literary texts – they are supposed to expand the readers’ knowledge about the world and language. Thirdly, they have a persuasive function, which is a distinctive feature of both popularised and non-literary texts – they are supposed to provoke the readers’ thoughts on the relationship between non-linguistic reality and the linguistic way of its interpretation, they also stimulate linguistic interests, which was particularly important in the past when the reflection on the native language was poor.


2016 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 86-99
Author(s):  
Vimbai Moreblessing Matiza

Dramatic and theatrical performances have a long history of being used as tools to enhance development in children and youth. In pre-colonial times there were some forms of drama and theatre used by different communities in the socialisation of children. It is in the same vein that this article, through the Intwasa koBulawayo performances, seeks to evaluate how drama and theatre are used to nurture children and youth into different developmental facets of their lives. The only difference which this article will take into cognisance is that the performances are done in a different environment, which is not the one used in the pre-colonial times. Although these performances were like this, the most important factor is the idea that children and youth are socialised through these performances. It is also against this backdrop that children and youth are growing up in a globalised environment, hence the performances should accommodate people from all walks of life and teach them relevant issues pertaining to life as they live it now. Thus the main task of the article is to spell out the role of drama and theatre in the nurturing of children and youth through socio economic and political development in Intwasa koBulawayo festivals.


2011 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 69-112
Author(s):  
Pierre Legendre

"Der Beitrag reevaluiert die «dogmatische Funktion», eine soziale Funktion, die mit biologischer und kultureller Reproduktion und folglich der Reproduktion des industriellen Systems zusammenhängt. Indem sie sich auf der Grenze zwischen Anthropologie und Rechtsgeschichte des Westens situiert, nimmt die Studie die psychoanalytische Frage nach der Rolle des Rechts im Verhalten des modernen Menschen erneut in den Blick. </br></br>This article reappraises the dogmatic function, a social function related to biological and cultural reproduction and consequently to the reproduction of the industrial system itself. On the borderline of anthropology and of the history of law – applied to the West – this study takes a new look at the question raised by psychoanalysis concerning the role of law in modern human behaviour. "


2021 ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
KAARLO HAVU

Abstract The article analyses the emergence of decorum (appropriateness) as a central concept of rhetorical theory in the early sixteenth-century writings of Erasmus and Juan Luis Vives. In rhetorical theory, decorum shifted the emphasis from formulaic rules to their creative application in concrete cases. In doing so, it emphasized a close analysis of the rhetorical situation (above all the preferences of the audience) and underscored the persuasive possibilities of civil conversation as opposed to passionate, adversarial rhetoric. The article argues that the stress put on decorum in early sixteenth-century theory is not just an internal development in the history of rhetoric but linked to far wider questions concerning the role of rhetoric in religious and secular lives. Decorum appears as a solution both to the divisiveness of language in the context of the Reformation and dynastic warfare of the early sixteenth century and as an adaptation of the republican tradition of political rhetoric to a changed, monarchical context. Erasmus and Vives maintained that decorum not only suppressed destructive passions and discord, but that it was only through polite and civil rhetoric (or conversation) that a truly effective persuasion was possible in a vast array of contexts.


2021 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
pp. 28-35
Author(s):  
I.M. Abirova ◽  
N.Zh. Eleugaliyeva ◽  
G.K. Zhumagaliyeva ◽  
M.G. Gusmanov

For humans and domestic animals, parasites of wild animals can pose a threat to health, and even life. In this regard, it is important to establish the pathways of circulation of pathogens of dangerous helminthiasis, to identify the nature of the focus and the role of wild animals in this process, since these data serve as the basis for the development of anti-parasite measures. The study of parasitic organisms of wild animals is of great importance for science and practice. In natural biocenosis, one of their joints is parasitic species, which, on the one hand, are involved in the regulation of the host population; on the other hand, they prevent the introduction and spread of new species related to the host, i.e. participate in ensuring homeostasis of biocenosis. Parasitizing in various hosts, both definitive and intermediate, helminthes can determine the number and distribution over the territory not only of these hosts, but also of other animal species associated with these hosts by trophic and other connections. The foregoing determines the relevance of the problem of studying the fauna of helminthes of wild animals in the West Kazakhstan region, which is currently under-researched. The species composition of helminthes of the fox (Vulpes vulpes) and the korsak (Vulpes corsac) in the territory of the West-Kazakhstan region region was explored. In most cases, the invasion was recorded in an associative form. Some helminthes cause serious diseases in humans and farm animals. As a result of our research, we identified 6 species of intestinal helminthes in the common fox, two of which (Alveococcus multilocularis, Toxocara canis) have epidemiological significance. In korsak, 3 types of helminthes were identified at the autopsy before the species.


Author(s):  
Alfred L. Brophy

This chapter discusses the role of historical analysis in property law. The history of property has been used to offer support for property rights. Their long history makes the distribution of property look normal, indeed natural and something that cannot or should not be challenged. However, historically in the U.S there have been competing visions of property. From the Progressive era onward especially, the history of property has been used to show the unequal distribution of property and to offer an alternative vision that expands the rights of non-owners of property. In the late twentieth and early twenty-first century, the history of opposition to feudalism and protection of the rights of non-owners was used to protect the rights of non-owners. Thus, the history of property has been a tool of judges and legislators to support property rights and it has also been, less frequently, a tool of critique.


2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 38-43
Author(s):  
Elena A. Glukhova ◽  
Pavel I. Safronov ◽  
Lev M. Burshtein

The article presents the one-dimensional basin modeling performed in four wells to reconstruct the thermal history of deposits and reconstruct the effective values of the heat flow density.


2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 85-97
Author(s):  
Béla Mester

Abstract The role of the diaries and memoirs in the process of the conscious self-reflection and their contribution to the emergence of modern individual personalities are well-known facts of the intellectual history. The present paper intends to analyze a special form of the creation of modern individual character; it is the self-creation of the writer as a conscious personality, often with a clearly formulated opinion about her/his own social role. There will be offered several examples from the 19th-century history of the Hungarian intelligentsia. This period is more or less identical with the modernization of the “cultural industry” in Hungary, dominated by the periodicals with their deadlines, fixed lengths of the articles, and professional editing houses on the one hand and the cultural nation building on the other. Concerning the possible social and cultural role of the intelligentsia, it is the moment of the birth of a new type, so-called public intellectual. I will focus on three written sources, a diary of a Calvinist student of theology, Péter (Litkei) Tóth, the memoirs of an influential public intellectual, Gusztáv Szontagh, and a belletristic printed diary of a young intellectual, János Asbóth.


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