This was a course I took in Fall 2021 with Dr. Cantrell that fulfilled my Global Citizenship Pillar Requirement. This class focused on world history from prehistory to 1500 CE. The course emphasized historical inquiry, cultural comparison, as well as ethnocentrism. We compared different cultures and learned about this time in history in a narrative format, as one large story. I enjoyed the way Dr. Cantrell taught this class, and it was a great opportunity to hear about a period of history that I had not learned about in any previous courses I had taken. I enjoyed finding the parallels in this course with the Music History courses I had taken, and felt I was able to dive deeper into the cultures and practices of other places in a way I hadn’t before. It was a tough course, but it was overall engaging and beneficial.

The artifact I have chosen to attach was a book report I had to complete on “The Adventures of Ibn Battuta.” Ibn Battuta was a scholar and explorer, and the book focused on his life as he journeyed through many different cultures. For this assignment we had to read the book in its entirety, and respond to a provided prompt in report form. I found that in the book, Ibn Battuta responded negatively to cultures different from his own, proving he was in fact ethnocentric.