I can recall reading the history textbooks in both primary and secondary school. In every historical account it seemed to praise or revere the Eurocentric formation of western civilization. I was told of this by my mother who was my first teacher. I was home schooled until I was in the 3rd grade. It was important to my parents that we learned different perspectives and historical accounts not provided in traditional education. We would read Native American, Hispanic American, Asian American, African American history and many others that were not Eurocentric or even white american. I remember how much bigger my world view had become in understanding how our country was formed and the indigenous cultures and people groups that had already existed in our country. It was in through my early years of education I found a reverence and appreciation for all people, cultures and ethnic groups. \u00a0I could empathize with their struggles and their triumphs. We all have a story no story is better than the other. All of our stories are woven together to form a united narrative the is both complex, painful and beautiful. Without holding all historical accounts in tandem the story in its fullness is never really told. When I began my public school education, I had a much different view of our world and our country. It made it difficult to sit through my history classes because it only told part of the story. When I would press my teachers they would quickly dismiss by saying that while what I am saying may be truthful we did not have time in our class to discuss the whole story. Therefore, I should not take away from our learning time by discussing matters not included in our textbook. \u00a0Beyond my history classes it was evident in my literature classes when we primarily read books by white European writers. It was clear that the “west was the best”. The east was told through the narrative of forming it roots based on the west. Even Christian history has be often told with the same Eurocentric narrative. It is not until the last few decades has scholars and theologians pressed for the shift in the narrative to be told in its entirety. \u00a0Earlier this year we read a book called “How Africa Shaped the Christian Mind” by Thomas C. Oden. In the book, he gives an historical account that dives into the African origin of the Christianity. this account is much different than the one that has been told for centuries that Christianity began in the west.<\/p>\n
The challenge of shifting away from the Eurocentric accounts continues. This week we read a book entitled the “The Silk Roads: A New History of the World” by Peter Frankopan. Within this book he attempts to take on that challenge and talk about the history of the world from an eastern perspective. \u00a0The Silk Roads were ancient trading routes that connected the east to the west. It was the central connection between China and the Mediterranean. The name of the road was derived from the trading of Silk from China. It was through these routes that civilizations emerged and connected. It was where economic growth occurred and political conflict surfaced. Frankopan\u00a0spends 25 chapters describing how the road was involved in revolutions, destruction, political wars, trading and resources, etc. While the Silk Roads hold historical significance, today there is a continued interest and investment in the east as the economic growth and resource dependency increases. \u00a0China and the middle east have grown in economic stability and necessity within our world economic system. For the US, we have established military bases in the Middle East to protect our access to oil and gas resources. There are very few items imported into the United States that do not say “made in China”. \u00a0The economic structure and system in America is dependent on the east. \u00a0It is apparent that the Silk Roads will continue to have significance in the the shaping of our worlds future. Frankopan writes “While we ponder where the next threat might come from, how best to deal with religious extremism, how to negotiate with states who seem willing to disregard international law, and how to build relations with peoples, cultures and regions about whom we have spent little or no time trying to understand, networks and connections are quietly being knitted together across the spine of Asia; or rather, they are being restored. The Silk Roads are rising again<\/em>.”[1]<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n [1]\u00a0Peter Frankopan, The Silk Roads: a new history of the world<\/i> (New York: Vintage Books, 2017), 522.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I can recall reading the history textbooks in both primary and secondary school. In every historical account it seemed to praise or revere the Eurocentric formation of western civilization. I was told of this by my mother who was my first teacher. I was home schooled until I was in the 3rd grade. It was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":82,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[762],"class_list":["post-14245","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-frankopan","cohort-lgp7"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14245","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/82"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14245"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14245\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14260,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14245\/revisions\/14260"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14245"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14245"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14245"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}