Opening Blog

IB 2010 First Post to class of 2012

We begin our two years together looking at the Enlightenment and the French Revolution.  The question I want to start with comes from an essay by Charles Tilly, “Does Modernization Breed Revolution?”  In other words, are revolutions inevitable due to the forces unleashed in society through modernizing industry, political institutions, social mobilization, etc.?

I would like your discussion to be in two stages.

Part the first, your initial submission should be completed by next Tuesday’s class, Sept. 24^th.  This should just be your initial gut reaction / answer to the question. 

Part the second, will be after clarification and readings in class about the Enlightenment, models of revolution and consideration of the French Revolution, in approximately three weeks.  And you will be expected to post a clarified answer along with two critical responses to your classmates.

As with any discussion, I expect this to be developing, so you may have reconsiderations, reflections along the way, which are fine, desirable even, so post them as we go.

Spring BLog the First

As we get ready for May, here is a prompt from a previous test to get us thinking about how much we know and how much we don't know.  As with previous entries, you should have one original post that attempts to answer the question.  Then for your follow up I would like you to work with a call and response blog to develop a more coherent answer to the test prompt.  This will be due in two weeks -- Feb. 24th in time for class to open up the discussion.  Good luck.


"Those who can win a war well can rarely make a good peace."  Select one peace treaty and by examining its clauses, explain how the winners treated the losers, and if you agree with the quotation.