Sign Up Now
Get instant access to over 1 million+ study documents
OR
Already registered? click here to login
By creating your account, you agree to our terms of service, privacy policy and student honor code.
Asian History
A vacuum was left by the Ming's expansion and rapid dissolution of maritime power. Even when the Ming's maritime power faded, China continued to play a major role in world trade. China had amassed an incredible resource of imported silver acquired from Portuguese and Spanish traders who pillaged the ore from Central and South America. Stockpiling its silver allowed China to create an incredible amount of wealth, and China soon transferred its silver into the monetary system. Whereas the Europeans continued to rely on a gold standard for their currency exchange, China banked on silver. Silver was not something that China had access to domestically, though, making it a unique choice for use as a currency. Silver was almost like a foreign currency that China adapted. Paper currency was its baby. With a vast store of silver, China was in the position of becoming a regional trade broker. China leveraged its geographic position and its status as a good trader with good credit. Other East Asian countries had already been trading with China, and now China was poised to be able to expand trade significantly with markets in Europe.
Many groups sought to exploit the opportunities China's new economic system presented. The political and economic landscape...
By 1600 CE and the height of Ming maritime power, Portuguese and East Asian countries were connected via trade routes. Portuguese and its East Asian mercantile colonies provided China was access to the global market. China occasionally served as a middleman or broker between the Portuguese traders and other countries in East Asia including Japan. Macau and other Portuguese mercantile settlements became strategically important for China during this time. Portugal would help build China's rural economy as well as feed its silver stockpile, as China also purchased new crops that it used to supplant the traditional diet.
The diversity of goods being traded was also expanding exponentially, leading to tremendous market growth and increased demands for raw materials. China exported a large number of specialty items sold mainly as luxury goods on the European market; China had little in the way of raw materials that Europe could covet with the exception of raw silk.
European powers stepped up their aggressive incursions into the Americas, committing genocide in order to rape the land of its wealth. Thus, China is indirectly implicated…
Reference
Pomeranz, K. & Wong, B. (n.d.). China and Europe. Retrieved online: http://afe.easia.columbia.edu/chinawh/web/s5/s5_4.html
(Postone, 1993) Habermas, a contemporary social historian contributor, was also very influenced by Weberian thinking in regarding rhetoric as an action rather than creating truth. As Weber or Habermas, or Marx or any other philosopher of history, among others, puts it, social history is a complex science and can have many facets. As Soon Won Park presents, connected with the colonial history of Korea, "history is now understood not simply
East Asia Ideal and Reality: Cultural Revolution in East Asia In recent history in East Asia, the laws, ideals, and models of government and culture have produced a reality that is somewhat different from that hoped for and proposed by these arbitrary systems. As Dong Zhongshu notes, the ancient Han dynasty erected an empire that lasted 2000 years based on a Confucian "vision of an omnipotent but disciplined sovereign, who sought to
shifting gender roles within Chinese history: Connections, differentiations, and articulations of Chinese women within the ideology of Confucianism The common stereotype of the East Asian female in the West is that of a frail flower: the most popular Westernized conceptions which leap to mind are that of the bound feet of a Chinese woman. However, the reality in early Chinese history was far more complex. As in the West, Chinese women
Neo-Confucianism: Reframing the tenants of Confucianism for a new era Neo-Confucianism arose as a synthesis of Buddhism and Taoism in China. Although there is often a tendency to elide the ideological orientations of all the so-called 'Eastern' religions together in Western thinking, the fact that such a fusion occurred is quite surprising in retrospect. Buddhism initially faced a campaign of official persecution and only gradually became an accepted part of the Chinese
history of Japan. First, it will describe the masculinization of Japanese culture during the Kamakura Shogunate period and explore why masculinization happened. Second, the changing roles and relationships with each Buddhism and Shinto in Japan from Nara through the Kamakura period will be explored. Third, Korea's relationship with China and Japan up until the 1600's will be compared and contrasted. Fourth, the kinds of social, political and cultural climate
Some cultural traditions exist in complete isolation from neighboring regions. For instance, Korea and China do not have the well-developed geisha role for women or the Samurai class of warriors. Japan's indigenous Shinto religion is not practiced on the Korean peninsula or in China. Taoism, an indigenous Chinese philosophical tradition, did not take root in Korea or Japan. Geography is a factor in why Korea, Japan, and China have evolved different