Blog 10 - The Crandall Printing Museum

I thought the Crandall Printing museum was pretty interesting. Even though the tour was rather long I learned a lot about the printing press and got a lot of new insights that I had never really taken into consideration before. Probably the most interesting part for me was the early history of the printing press. Its creator Johannes Gutenberg was very strange to me. Mainly because he hired six crews when he knew he didn’t have the money. This was very peculiar to me and made me agree with the tour guides that he must have been inspired to do that so he could spread the printing press around the globe. The other thing that interested me about the early history of the printing press was that it was such a long process. I couldn’t even imagine myself working on a printing press because it just seems so frustrating because there are so many little things that can go wrong. However, I think that I feel that way because I am from a different generation and am use to such technological gadgets as the Internet. I am use to printing a piece of paper in a minute and not spending an hour putting in every piece of type and such. The process was just very interesting to me and made me think a lot about the printing press. The other part of the tour that was interesting was when we all learned about the printing of the Book of Mormon. I liked this part of the tour because it seems somewhat unrealistic that they pumped out the Book of Mormon as fast as they did. They printed five thousand Book of Mormons faster than anyone thought was possible. Crandall one of the tour guides and the creator of the museum told us that he believed that there wasn’t any divine intervention in the creating of the Book of Mormon. He just believed that God gave them strength that they didn’t know they had. That is how they finished the Book of Mormon as fast as they did. I don’t know if I agree with his theory. I know that God had to give some kind of divine help but I don’t know how he did it. I think personally I will give all logical possibilities open on how I think he helped the printers print the five thousand copies of the Book of Mormon. I thought that the Crandall Printing museum was very interesting and I though it was a very good educational experience. I learned a great deal about the printing press from the museum and I feel that I would have never learned that much about the printing press if I didn’t go to the museum for class. Overall, I was very grateful for the experience of going to the Crandall Printing museum.

Blog 9 - Women's rights - why not sooner?

I believe that there are many reasons that women did not organize themselves earlier. These reasons include: the cult of domesticity, men running politics. The main reason I believe women started working together is because of the abolition movement. The abolition movement was the first time that women had the chance to be active in a form of politics. The abolition movement gave women the chance to get out of the cult of domesticity and fight for something. Women had the chance to be somewhat active in politics during the American Revolution but after that they lost their political power. During the American Revolution women would organize boycotts, help soldiers and there were a few women that actually fought. However, after the American Revolution the idea known as the cult of domesticity rose into power. The cult of domesticity told women that they had to stay at home and provide for their families. They were suppose to support their husband in any way possible and politics was seen as man work that wasn’t fit for women. The second great awakening helped end the cult of domesticity. The second great awakening helped get women out of the house and into the public sphere. Women would leave the house and attend the church meetings. This led to women later getting active I the abolition movement. Sense many felt that it was a Christian duty to be an abolitionist; women were not excluded from helping. The abolitionist movement gave women black and white a chance to work in politics and fight to end slavery. When many think of the women in the abolitionist movement they think of Harriet Tubman and Sojourner Truth, however, there were more white women than black women that were prominent in the abolition movement. This was for many reasons; white women had more freedom, had better income, had a better education, etc. The abolition movement gave women the chance they needed to work in politics and eventually this leaded them to work on getting equal rights for themselves. I do not know if what I am going to sat is true, this is just a hypothesis of why I think women did not get rights sooner. I think that women maybe did not get rights sooner because they just were trying to support there men in the revolution and felt that the would eventually get rights. I believe that women thought that if they helped in the revolution that they would soon enough get equal rights when a government was set up. I think this was there plan before the cult of domesticity took control of women. I believe the most interesting part of the cult of domesticity is that it formed in Great Britain then moved to the United States of America. I thought that women in the United States wouldn’t let Great Britain hold them back, however, they did especially among the upper class. The upper class would also be the most educated women which is why this is a shame that they bought into the cult of domesticity. The upper class women have then best chance to make a change and when they are following popular trends and not trying to learn, women aren’t going to have equal rights. The cult of domesticity was a lot about being a good Christian. When abolitionists started stemming from churches women had their chance to enter the political sphere and be seen as good Christians. This eventually stemmed into women realizing that they needed to get there right to vote and acting upon it. If it wasn’t for the abolitionist movement I believe that it would have been a while until women got equal rights.

Blog 8 Amistad

I really liked the movie Amistad and found it really informatice. As of right now I think I’m going to do a film minor here at BYU and so I am quite interested in film. I also believe that Morgan Freeman and Anthony Hopkins are both very talented actors. Even though I believe this I think that the best actor in Amistad was Djimon Hounsou who played Cinque. His portrayal of what it was like to be sold into slavery was quite moving. The scene where Cinque explains how he became a slave was very shocking and I imagine it is not even close to the other horrors that happened to slaves. The reason that I believe slaves were so easy to buy was because the slave traders had Africans hunting there own kind. The white slave traders did not know the lay of the land in Africa but the Africans that worked for them did. The white slave traders did not have to do the dirty work of capturing the slaves they just had to bring firearms and other goods that they could trade for slaves. The movie really illustrated this point when it showed Cinque getting hit in the head and taken away from his tribe and family. However, even though this scene illustrated slavery, I believe that the images of being on the slave ship were the most shocking and they helped me visualize the horrors of slavery the best. The slave ship was of course horrible conditions. All of the African slaves were chained up with no room to really even lie down. There are two scenes of this movie that I believe will stay in my head for a long time. These two being when the African slaves were being fed in the bottom of the ship and the scene where they throw the slaves off of the boat, because they do not have enough food for them. The scene where they are being passed out food is just pure cruelty. All of the African slaves are all underfed, and because of this they are all desperately reaching out for food. The food that they the slave ship crew is feeding them looks pretty gross but sense the slaves are so underfed they are gobbling it up. The slave crew is also very selective of who they actually feed. The African slaves to not have bowls or plates, they are being fed directly into there hands. The slaves who are not being fed are just trying to get any scrapes they can get. Watching this process brought a chill that went up and down my spine. I tried to think of what it would be like, but for the most part I could not even fathom what being in those conditions would be like. I can’t imagine how someone can treat another human being like that. These images reminded me of the Nazi concentration camps during the Second World War. I have a very hard time understanding how the Nazis can use propaganda so effectively to de-humanize a whole race and treat them as horrible as they did. I believe that the concentration camps and the slave trade were very similar as they both dehumanized large groups of people. The second scene that really affected me was when the crewmembers of the slave ship threw about fifty slaves off the ship. I feel that it was so disturbing to me because many of the slaves were women and children and so they were screaming. From a business stand point it also amazes me how profitable the slave trade was. The slave ship could just kill off many of their slaves and still have a profitable journey. This fact astounds me. In the trial scene they bring up this question again and the British general (I do not know exactly what rank he was) talks about how lucrative a business the slave trade was. This movie really helped me see the terrors of slave trade better then I could before. Some members of our class talked about how they did not like watching movies in class. I remember one girl even went as far as saying something like “I’m not in high school anymore so I don’t want to watch dumb movies.” I have to completely disagree with her. Even though I did not really enjoy the movie A More Perfect Union, I found both Amistad and the John Adams mini series very informative. I was very happy that I had the opportunity to watch this movie, I know that I probably would not have watched it if it wasn’t in this class. Amistad really helped me visualize better then I ever could before.

Blog 7 - Federalist Paper #10

The federalist papers are actually quite interesting. My favorite federalist paper (out of the ones we read) was the tenth federalist paper. The question of how to dissolve factions has always intrigued me, as well as it has interested elementary school teachers. Factions have always caused problems in governments over history. What I find is the best about these papers is that the Alexander Hamilton realizes that a government cannot do away with factions without doing away with the liberties that the people of the United States of America are promised. The governments that have gotten away with most factions are dictatorships and even then they still face opposition. It is impossible to make everyone have the same beliefs. Even in our own Mormon religion we know that everyone will not share the same beliefs in the end. Even though many people will be converted to Mormonism in the end there is still Satan and the sons of perdition that will be of a different fraction. Because of this and some historical examples of factions not succeeding (such as factions fighting internally against the Nazis, Mussolini, Communists, etc) I think that it is impossible to not factions in a society. All of the governments I wrote above tried to make a utopian society and all of them failed. Alexander Hamilton and all of the founding fathers knew that utopian societies wouldn’t work. They didn’t even try to make a utopian society because they knew it was impossible. That is what I find is so magnificent about the founding fathers is that they did were realistic and did not try to reach the unimaginable, however, they knew they were going to do something that had never been done before. Besides removing liberty and making everyone the same Alexander Hamilton though of another extremist measures to remove factions; these being making an enlightened statesmen aka a dictator. I mentioned some dictators in the governments before. Dictators cant be trusted to make decisions when they are given so much power and when they wield so much influence over the people. Alexander Hamilton also knows that it is hard to find an enlightened statesman that is smart enough to lead a new nation like the United States of America. It is hard to find someone with all of the necessary skills that will not eventually corrupt and cease to be a democratic republic. Another big part of the tenth federalist paper is the when Alexander Hamilton challenges the idea that smaller republics are better then larger republic. This belief came to pass because older republics thought that to have a successful government that there needed to a majority that supported all of the same ideals and the citizens all needed to somewhat know each other. The founding fathers knew that a bigger government is better if it is not a true democracy. The founding fathers knew that tyranny of the majority was a big issue and that in a true democracy it would rule over the government. That is why the founding fathers did not do a true democracy and did a republic like they did and that which stands today, an enlarged democratic republic. In an enlarged democratic republic there can be tyranny of the majority, however, there can also be tyranny of the minority. That is what is so great about the United States of America. Alexander Hamilton and the other writers of the federalist papers (John Jay and James Madison) knew that factions were going to stay in the government and that America was a big republic and was just going to get bigger and bigger. That is why they decided to make a democratic republic and let the factions remain in the United States of America.

Blog 6 - A More Perfect Union

I found the film A More Perfect Union to be very interesting but I also thought it was a pretty cheesy movie. The information was useful but many of the other aspects of it I found typical to a BYU produced movie. Probably the most interesting information I saw was the portrayal of the founding fathers. All of the founding fathers acted differently then I thought they would. However, I do not personally know the founding fathers so I cant really judge this. How the founding fathers were portrayed in the John Adams film also surprised me, however, both of the reasons I was surprised are completely different. In John Adams all of the founding fathers were kind of rough around the edges. They weren’t always polite and always spoke their mind. In this film I felt they were all overly polite. James Madison always was very polite to everyone and never got in any arguments or seemed very frustrated. One reason I think that I was surprised is the skill level of acting in each of these productions. Paul Giamatti is a very gifted and talented actor while I have no idea who played James Madison. The actor who played James Madison did not show much facial expression to my memory. He was rather plain and did not show much emotion. In contrast in John Adams all of the actors showed a great deal of emotion as they represented there colonies / states. The actor in it who showed the most emotion in A More Perfect Union was Alexander Hamilton. The portrayal of Alexander Hamilton was to me one of the most intriguing parts of the movie. I do not know too much about Alexander Hamilton besides the fact that he set up the treasury and was shot by Aaron Burr. Seeing him try to fight to help the Virginia Plan out and how frustrated he was with the other delegates from New York was quite interesting. Constantly, I see his face on the ten-dollar bill and am excited to learn more about him in this class. Overall, I felt that the movie was quite interesting. I definitely liked the John Adams film better but I was glad to watch this one.