Writing Homework Help

The Questions to Consider will be part of the midterm and final exams in the course. You should study these questions using your textbook, but you are also encouraged to use any other sources, such as Wikipedia. A good answer to a question to consider should be about a long paragraph. Check out an example.

Unit 1 Introduction

• How has geography influenced the course of history?
• What is human progress?

Unit 2 Pre-History

• What role did technological innovation play in the development of early humankind?
• What was important about the shift to the use of systematic agriculture in the Neolithic period?

Unit 3 Ancient Near East

• Why did cities first form in Mesopotamia?
• What enabled ancient Egypt to exist for so long a period of time as a cultural unit?

Unit 4 Classical Mediterranean

• What factors contributed to the eventual destruction of the Roman Empire?
• Why were the Ancient Greeks so interested in questions of philosophy?

Unit 5 Classical South Asia

• How and why did Harappan civilization end?
• Why did Buddhism arise as a religious reform movement in South Asia?

Unit 6 Mesoamerica

• Why did the large-scale civilization emerge somewhat later in the Americas than in Eurasia?
• What factors enabled the Aztec Empire to expand so quickly in the fifteenth century?

Unit 7 Classical China

• What were some of the social and political characteristics of classical Chinese civilization of the Han Dynasty?
• Compare and contrast the origin, development and characteristics of Buddhism, Christianity and Confucianism.

Unit 8 Russia

• What were some of the distinctive features of early Russian civilization based in Kiev?
• What factors enabled Byzantine civilization to last until the fifteenth century?

Unit 9 Islam and Empire

• How did Islam continue the traditions of Christianity and Judaism?
• How did the Islamic empire of the Abbasid era mirror some of the features of the Roman empire?

Unit 10 Charlemagne and the European Middle Ages

• Why did the center of Western civilization move from the Mediterranean to Northwestern Europe?
• What impact did the Crusades have on the development of European civilization?

Unit 11 Mongols

• Compare and contrast the origin, development and characteristics of Islam, Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism and Confucianism.
• Why were the Mongols able to create such a large empire?

Unit 12 African Society

• What were some of the distinctive features of societies in early Ghana and Mali?
• Was there an early “African” cultural or social pattern?

Unit 13 Japan

• What were some of the characteristics of early Japanese history?
• How much did Japanese political practice borrow from the Chinese?

Unit 14 Renaissance and Reformation

• Why did the Renaissance begin in Italy?
• Why did the Protestant reform movements in Christianity succeed in the early sixteenth century?

Unit 15 Final Exam

• How did the discovery of other world societies change Europe’s view of itself?
• What specific technologies did Europeans develop that allowed them to sail the open seas?

Unit 16 The World in 1500

• How has geography influenced the course of history?
• What is human progress?