Chapter 8

I always thought of China as a powerful force of a country. It was no surprise for me when I read about China's uprising, its "golden age." It was also not that surprising to learn about the role of women in the Song Dynasty. One thing that I also knew about was the practice of foot binding. Even though this was not nothing new that I learned, it still shocks that Chinese women went through these excruciating painful attempts to appear to be beautiful, elite women in Chinese society. Foot binding also reminds me of our society and how some people go through expensive plastic surgery to look better than what they think of themselves or more beautiful than before. Another thing that was interesting to me was how the Chinese viewed the northern nomads. The Chinese people called the nomads barbarians and viewed them as inferior, but they still used them for their own necessities like their military and luxury goods. The building of the Great Wall to keep them out sounds very familiar in today's society in this specific time. I am greatly reminded of issues, ideas, and trends in today's world and society from reading this chapter.

Chapter 9 and Chapter 10

What stood out to me from Strayer in these two chapters was how important it is to learn and understand the history of Islam and how we are "limited and shaped by our histories." I put those two ideas together because I think that what Strayer said is true in how she view history as a whole and as a society. We are limited in that we only learn so much in history and in how we are taught history concerning what is more important to know. Because of this, society today is only comfortable with their own history and how it only affects them rather than knowing other people's history and how it can affect us and everyone else as well. I think that Chapter 9 and Chapter 10 not only emphasizes the different religions and its followers, but it also emphasizes the importance of knowing and understanding how it functioned in the past so we can connect it to today's world. I agree with Strayer in that we need to see the world how others viewed it as well as thinking of other society's history as significant rather than inferior to our own history.