Don't forget, we will NOT have class in History 425 tomorrow, Wednesday, 1-23. I will be regaling the Richland Kiwanians as the featured entertainment.
History 469 and 450 will meet, as scheduled. The Kiwanians go back to work or retirement promptly at 1 pm...
History 425 WILL meet on Friday, 1-25, as usual, l2:10.
Quiz on this information to follow(NOT!)...
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Sunday, January 20, 2008
A new contender
A propos of last year's contest in this space for Foreign Leader past or present with the most exotic name, e.g. Megawatti Bambang of Indonesia...there's a new entrant. The new President of the Turkmens is...Gurbanguli Berdymukhamedov, who recently replaced the immortal Saparmurat Niyazov, the self-styled "Father of all Turkmen" who named all the days of the week after himself, and some of the months of the year as well. President Berdymukhamedov--just try saying that three times quickly!-- has already reversed "Father's" decision to disallow circuses and opera(no word yet on returning the names of the days of the week), so he's on his way to a different place on the political landscape of Turkmenistan, but he's certainly got a name reminiscent of his illustrious precedessor.
A toast to the Turkmens and their new Leader!
A toast to the Turkmens and their new Leader!
Saturday, January 19, 2008
Food geography--Italia
One of the great things about travel and geography is getting to know the various regions of a given country. Italy has a lot of them, and each has made its own distinctive contribution to the great cause of Italian cuisine. Liguria is in the northwest of the country, next door to France--Europeans know it as the Italian Riveria, because it's located on the Ligurian sea(the Grant's tomb part of the post, in case you missed it).
Its culinary signatures are its fish soup--cioppino--basil and(surprise!)pesto. Ligurians use pesto the way the rest of the Italy uses marinara sauce...it is the standard topping. You can make yourself a quick introduction to Ligurian Italia by making this dish, the recipe for which is here:
Penne with pesto, green beans and potatoes
I standard-sized package of pesto, which you can buy at a good grocery or Italian food store. If you want to make your own, there are thousands of good recipes on the web…you’ll need fresh basil, extra-virgin olive oil, pecorino-romano cheese and salt
Then…
1/2 lb small red potatoes, peeled and cut into slices about 1/4 inch thick
1/2 lb young, slender green beans, stem ends trimmed
1 lb penne, ziti or trenette pasta
1 tablespoon unsalted butter, room temp
Bring a large pot 3/4 full of water to a rolling boil and add about 2 tablespoons salt. Add potatoes and green beans and cook until tender, about 5 minutes. Using a large slotted spoon, transfer the potatoes and beans to a large, warmed serving bowl. Cover the bowl tightly with aluminum foil to keep the veggies warm.
Bring the water back to a rolling boil, add the penne, stir well, and cook, stirring occasionally(about l0 minutes), until al dente. Scoop out and reserve about 2 ladlesfull of the cooking water, then drain the pasta.
Add the drained pasta to the vegetables and then add the pesto. Stir and toss until the pasta and veggies are evenly coated with the sauce, adjusting with some of the cooking water if necessary. Add the butter and toss to coat evenly. Serve at once….
If you want more on Ligurian food and/or info on Italian cuisine from all the regions of the country, you can't do better than this site
A City in (Current)History, 2008
My oldest pal--we've known each other since the age of six months, so i'm told--wrote this about an incident that happened yesterday near her workplace on Capitol Hill, DC:
"It's a beautiful day in my neighborhood, a beautiful day in my neighborhood, won't you be my neighbor?
Well maybe not yesterday afternoon. One of those days we have in DC from time to time when something just a little bit odd pops out. In this case, it was a guy walking down the street with a loaded shotgun, a samurai sword and a bag that was found filled with gunpowder. He was walking down the street near my office, heading towards the capital. It's the sort of thing that sooner or later does draw attention, and he was stopped by the Capitol Police who arrested him and then sent a robot bomb detecting unit over to his car to blow up a suspicious package or two there.
Of course it is the sort of thing that does cause the streets to close down and police to swarm a bit, so people coming back from lunch to their offices (this happened around 1pm) get not only a floor show, but the fun of trying to find a new way to get back to their office because they can't cross one of the police lines."
That's one of the endearing features of both Washington and New York--both cities are nutcase magnets. Eccentrics are drawn there, especially to New York, like moths to light. One prefers the nonlethal eccentrics, of course, over the ones with shotguns and samurai swords, but it's difficult to sort them out...generally speaking, long live cities!!
"It's a beautiful day in my neighborhood, a beautiful day in my neighborhood, won't you be my neighbor?
Well maybe not yesterday afternoon. One of those days we have in DC from time to time when something just a little bit odd pops out. In this case, it was a guy walking down the street with a loaded shotgun, a samurai sword and a bag that was found filled with gunpowder. He was walking down the street near my office, heading towards the capital. It's the sort of thing that sooner or later does draw attention, and he was stopped by the Capitol Police who arrested him and then sent a robot bomb detecting unit over to his car to blow up a suspicious package or two there.
Of course it is the sort of thing that does cause the streets to close down and police to swarm a bit, so people coming back from lunch to their offices (this happened around 1pm) get not only a floor show, but the fun of trying to find a new way to get back to their office because they can't cross one of the police lines."
That's one of the endearing features of both Washington and New York--both cities are nutcase magnets. Eccentrics are drawn there, especially to New York, like moths to light. One prefers the nonlethal eccentrics, of course, over the ones with shotguns and samurai swords, but it's difficult to sort them out...generally speaking, long live cities!!
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Your almighty 425 tier III...
Without further ado, the instructions for 425 tier III:
History 425—City in History—Writing Assignment 2008
This is a Tier III course, which brings with it a substantial, as in 5-7 page, writing assignment. What you will do is this: first, assume you are a professional researcher. You have been asked to do a profile of a city OUTSIDE NORTH AMERICA that will be of interest to businesspeople preparing to live and do business overseas. You will proceed as follows:
A) Choose a city outside north America that interests you. If you’ve always been interested in London, for example, this is your chance to get to know it better, a lot better, for CREDIT.
b) START READING about your city. If there is a “biography,” a contemporary portrait of a city like Alastair Horne’s Seven Ages of Paris, read it. Then begin a search for related articles and books. You will be doing the bulk of your reading from newspapers and magazines, most likely, such as the London Times or Le Figaro for a city like Paris, or the International Herald Tribune, or Time or Newsweek or National Geographic. Travel books and magazines can be of help too. Lots of cities have websites, too, and you should consult those. You’ll be expected to read 2-3 articles per week about your city or events in it, writing and filing away a summary of each article as you go along(for a total of about l6-20 summaries). In mid-April, you will stop reading and prepare to write the profile based on your findings. Everyone needs to keep track of his/her reading, documenting it all along, establishing a “paper trail,” so to speak.
c) Once you are prepared to write the profile, you should do three things: one, give your businessperson an idea of how history and/or geography has shaped this city. New York is New York in part because of its geography; what major factor(s) made London/Paris/Brussels/Rio/Cape Town/Chennai what it is today? Secondly, what is a/the major preoccupation of this city at this point in time? One obvious example is London, shaken as it has been by terrorist incidents and plots. Finally, what should a foreigner know about this city’s business climate? What kinds of initiatives and proposals would have the best chance of succeeding? How is the cost of living?
D) Hand in the paper, your summaries and articles(your paper trail, in other words)on the designated day in mid-April. You should be finished with it before finals…
History 425—City in History—Writing Assignment 2008
This is a Tier III course, which brings with it a substantial, as in 5-7 page, writing assignment. What you will do is this: first, assume you are a professional researcher. You have been asked to do a profile of a city OUTSIDE NORTH AMERICA that will be of interest to businesspeople preparing to live and do business overseas. You will proceed as follows:
A) Choose a city outside north America that interests you. If you’ve always been interested in London, for example, this is your chance to get to know it better, a lot better, for CREDIT.
b) START READING about your city. If there is a “biography,” a contemporary portrait of a city like Alastair Horne’s Seven Ages of Paris, read it. Then begin a search for related articles and books. You will be doing the bulk of your reading from newspapers and magazines, most likely, such as the London Times or Le Figaro for a city like Paris, or the International Herald Tribune, or Time or Newsweek or National Geographic. Travel books and magazines can be of help too. Lots of cities have websites, too, and you should consult those. You’ll be expected to read 2-3 articles per week about your city or events in it, writing and filing away a summary of each article as you go along(for a total of about l6-20 summaries). In mid-April, you will stop reading and prepare to write the profile based on your findings. Everyone needs to keep track of his/her reading, documenting it all along, establishing a “paper trail,” so to speak.
c) Once you are prepared to write the profile, you should do three things: one, give your businessperson an idea of how history and/or geography has shaped this city. New York is New York in part because of its geography; what major factor(s) made London/Paris/Brussels/Rio/Cape Town/Chennai what it is today? Secondly, what is a/the major preoccupation of this city at this point in time? One obvious example is London, shaken as it has been by terrorist incidents and plots. Finally, what should a foreigner know about this city’s business climate? What kinds of initiatives and proposals would have the best chance of succeeding? How is the cost of living?
D) Hand in the paper, your summaries and articles(your paper trail, in other words)on the designated day in mid-April. You should be finished with it before finals…
Mapmania
Continuing the thread about geography, and more particularly geography and politics, there is a great link for you to explore
here. It's the Department of History at the United States Military Academy, and they have done a great service in putting hundreds of maps online, a lot of them dealing(for some strange reason)with this country's wars, but many of them historical, e.g. Europe in l922. On the table of contents, look for the section "Our Atlases" and click.
I've already used the site many times, and I never even had to stand at attention. Go Army!!
here. It's the Department of History at the United States Military Academy, and they have done a great service in putting hundreds of maps online, a lot of them dealing(for some strange reason)with this country's wars, but many of them historical, e.g. Europe in l922. On the table of contents, look for the section "Our Atlases" and click.
I've already used the site many times, and I never even had to stand at attention. Go Army!!
More GEOGRAPHY(!)
Geographymania lives...here is the short-answer portion of the GEO midterm for 450. Even if you won't be doing these for credit, test yourself...no cheating, now!
History 450…in addition to identifying countries and caps and a few other features, you will be asked SOME of the following short-answer questions on the upcoming GEO midterm…as usual, prepare ALL of them unless you are a betting man/woman.
What European regional capital is known as “Titanic town?”
Match the European country with its homegrown alcoholic beverage: Calvados, ouzo, shlivovitz, palinka, Bushmills, Pilsner, Dom Perignon
What central. European country is home to the Lippizaner stud farm?
Where is Dracula's castle? Name the country AND region
What French city was seat of the Papacy for a time a few centuries ago?
Which central European country is famous for gulyas and paprika?
What east European city is the location of the Lenin ship
Yard, famous for its role in the l980s? What country was it in before l945?
What defines the states we know as the “Baltics” and the “Balkans”? Name two Baltic and Balkan states.
What country’s capital has been the head of two major religious empires?
Where is the home base of the Ibizian hound, one of the biggest, skinniest dogs you will find? How about the celebrated hunting dog known as the “Kurzhaar?”
What accounts for both French and German being heard on the streets of the eastern French city of Strasbourg?
What city is considered the birthplace of the Beatles?
Identify the countries to which these Olympic cities belong: Turin , Lillehammer, Athens, Grenoble, Sarajevo, Munich, Barcelona, St. Moritz
Which city is lucky enough to have Schipol as its airport, one of the most user-friendly in the world?
For which southeast European country is the region of Kosovo the cradle of civilization?
Cartographic confusion: What are these cities called today, and where are they? Koloszvar, Caporetto, Breslau, Take one of them and explain how its name got changed.
History 450…in addition to identifying countries and caps and a few other features, you will be asked SOME of the following short-answer questions on the upcoming GEO midterm…as usual, prepare ALL of them unless you are a betting man/woman.
What European regional capital is known as “Titanic town?”
Match the European country with its homegrown alcoholic beverage: Calvados, ouzo, shlivovitz, palinka, Bushmills, Pilsner, Dom Perignon
What central. European country is home to the Lippizaner stud farm?
Where is Dracula's castle? Name the country AND region
What French city was seat of the Papacy for a time a few centuries ago?
Which central European country is famous for gulyas and paprika?
What east European city is the location of the Lenin ship
Yard, famous for its role in the l980s? What country was it in before l945?
What defines the states we know as the “Baltics” and the “Balkans”? Name two Baltic and Balkan states.
What country’s capital has been the head of two major religious empires?
Where is the home base of the Ibizian hound, one of the biggest, skinniest dogs you will find? How about the celebrated hunting dog known as the “Kurzhaar?”
What accounts for both French and German being heard on the streets of the eastern French city of Strasbourg?
What city is considered the birthplace of the Beatles?
Identify the countries to which these Olympic cities belong: Turin , Lillehammer, Athens, Grenoble, Sarajevo, Munich, Barcelona, St. Moritz
Which city is lucky enough to have Schipol as its airport, one of the most user-friendly in the world?
For which southeast European country is the region of Kosovo the cradle of civilization?
Cartographic confusion: What are these cities called today, and where are they? Koloszvar, Caporetto, Breslau, Take one of them and explain how its name got changed.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)