Globalizing Networks of Communication and Exchange

 Main Idea: connecting the Eastern and Western hemispheres changed everything!  Global networks shake up the old trade routes  Technology is key  Everybody’s in the game  Europe becomes the major player  The Columbian Exchange  Religions spread and change  Reflections in art

1- Global networks shake up the old trade routes  From the “new world” would come new products  They were traded on the old trade routes, too  Some benefit, some lose out

2- Technology is key  Europeans suddenly can go ANYWHERE. How?  Collecting and expanding knowledge of Classical Europe, Islamic Empires, Asia  New Technology: tools (astrolabe), ship designs (caravels)  Better understanding of the environment: global wind and ocean currents

3- Everybody’s in the game  China: Admiral Zheng He leads massive fleets to SE Asia, Africa… and beyond?  Portugal: starts a school of navigation, travel and trade to West Africa, begins empire.  Spain: sponsors Columbus and others to cross Atlantic and Pacific  Northern Europe looks for NW Passage  Polynesians connect the dots in South Pacific

4- Europe becomes the major player  In Asia, they take over Indian Ocean shipping  Silver from N&S America becomes the global currency  Mercantilism: the Joint-Stock Company  Control domestic and colonial economies  Countries use them to compete  The Atlantic System: moving resources, products, and people, connecting East & West

5- The Columbian Exchange  European colonization of the Americas. Effects:  Spread of Europe diseases: small pox, measles, flu  American foods to Old World: potato, corn, tomato  Cash Crop Colonies: sugar in Brazil, Caribbean; tobacco in North America.  Europeans bring grains and domestic animals (horse, cow, pig) to Americas.  African slaves bring important foods (rice, okra).  Old world population boom from new world foods  Environmental problems in the new world

6- Religions spread and change  Islam continues to spread in Africa & Asia  Adapted to local cultures  Sunni – Shia split intensifies  Christianity spread to New World  Diversified by diffusion and reformation  Syncretic and new forms of religion developed  Voodoo in Caribbean  Cult of the Saints in Latin America

7-Reflections in art  Merchants made profits, governments collected taxes, money for the arts increased  Literacy expanded, popular authors  Shakespeare, Cervantes