Chapter 7 Blog
I loved how Strayer opened the chapter with the small story of Nayan Chanda ordering an iPod for his son and realizing the iPod was being shipped from China. It made the chapter suddenly relatable and drew me in closer because of how relatable it was. One of the most important sentences in the chapter was when Strayer wrote, “Economically speaking, commerce often altered consumption and shaped daily life” (282). He also talked about how trade transformed social hierarchies as well as political life. Interestingly, this is still true today. The Trump administration has tried to impose numerous tariffs on a multitude of imported products, especially products imported from China. Another thing that stuck out to me was the way Strayer discussed trade as being a means for religious ideas to spread, such as Buddhism. We often associate trade as only pertaining to tangible objects, but interestingly a plethora of ideas were spreading along these routes as well...