Reflections on the Re-awakening East

Glossary
Bertrand Russell

Born: May 18, 1872

Died: Feb 2, 1970
British philosopher, logician, and social reformer, founding figure in
the analytic movement in Anglo-American philosophy, and recipient of
the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1950. Russell's contributions to logic,
epistemology, and the philosophy of mathematics established him as
one of the foremost philosophers of the 20th century. To the general
public, however, he was best known as a campaigner for peace and as a
popular writer on social, political, and moral subjects. During a long,
productive, and often turbulent life, he published more than 70 books
and about 2,000 articles, married four times, became involved in
innumerable public controversies, and was honoured and reviled in
almost equal measure throughout the world.

Alexander III

Known as "Alexander the Great". 356-323. B.C.

King of Macedonia (336-323) and conquerer of Asia Minor, Syria,
Egypt, Babylonia, and Persia. His reign marked the beginning of the
Hellenistic Age.

American Imperialism American imperialism is a term referring to the economic, military, and
cultural influence of the United States on other countries. The concept
of an American Empire was first popularized during the presidency of
James K. Polk who led the United States into the MexicanAmerican
War of 1846, and the eventual annexation of the territories like
California and the Gadsden purchase.
arms race

The term arms race, in its original usage, is a competition between two
or more parties to have the best armed forces. Each party competes to
produce larger numbers of weapons, greater armies, or superior
military technology in a technological escalation. Nowadays the term
is commonly used to describe any competition where there is no
absolute goal, only the relative goal of staying ahead of the other
competitors, essentially the goal of proving to be "better".

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Glossary
Asian Population

Asia is the worlds largest and most populous continent, located

primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.6% of
the Earths total surface area (or 29.9% of its land area) and with
approximately 4 billion people, it hosts 60% of the worlds current
human population. During the 20th century Asias population nearly
quadrupled. China was the largest and most advanced economy on
earth for much of recorded history, until the British Empire (excluding
India) overtook it in the mid 19th century. Japan has had for only
several decades after WW2 the largest economy in Asia and secondlargest of any single nation in the world, after surpassing the Soviet
Union (measured in net material product) in 1986 and Germany in
1968.

barbarism

There is a significant difference in meaning between barbarism and

barbarity. Both denote some absence of civilization, but the word
civilization itself has several different senses, one the opposite of
barbarism, the other the opposite of barbarity. On the one hand
civilization may refer to the scientific, artistic, and cultural attainments
of advanced societies; and it is this sense that figures in the meaning of
barbarism. The English word barbarism originally referred to
incorrect use of language, but it is now used more generally to refer to
ignorance or crudity in matters of taste, including verbal expression:
The New Yorker would never tolerate such barbarisms. On the other
hand, civilization may refer to the basic social order that allows people
to resolve their differences peaceably, and it is this sense--that is,
civilization as opposed to savagery--that figures in the meaning of
barbarity, which refers to savage brutality or cruelty in actions, as in
The accounts of the emperor's barbarity shocked the world.

bloc

A group of nations, parties, or persons united for common action.

Carlyle

Thomas Carlyle (4 December 1795 5 February 1881) was a Scottish

satirical writer, essayist, historian and teacher during the Victorian era.

civilized

Showing evidence of moral and intellectual advancement; humane,

ethical, and reasonable.

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Glossary
Columbus

Columbus, Christopher:
born between August 26 and October 31?, 1451, Genoa [Italy]
died May 20, 1506, Valladolid, Spain.
talian Cristoforo Colombo , Spanish Cristbal Coln master
navigator and admiral whose four transatlantic voyages (149293,
149396, 14981500, and 150204) opened the way for European
exploration, exploitation, and colonization of the Americas. He has
long been called the discoverer of the New World, although Vikings
such as Leif Eriksson had visited North America five centuries earlier.
Columbus made his transatlantic voyages under the sponsorship of
Ferdinand II and Isabella I, the Catholic Monarchs of Aragon, Castile,
and Leon in Spain. He was at first full of hope and ambition, an
ambition partly gratified by his title Admiral of the Ocean Sea,
awarded to him in April 1492, and by the grants enrolled in the Book
of Privileges (a record of his titles and claims); however, he died a
disappointed man.

Communism

Communism is a revolutionary socialist movement to create a

classless, moneyless, and stateless social order structured upon
common ownership of the means of production, as well as a social,
political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of this
social order.

cosmopolitanism

Cosmopolitanism is the ideology that all human ethnic groups belong

to a single community based on a shared morality. Cosmopolitanism
may entail some sort of world government or it may simply refer to
more inclusive moral, economic, and/or political relationships between
nations or individuals of different nations. A person who adheres to the
idea of cosmopolitanism in any of its forms is called a cosmopolitan or
cosmopolite.

culture

The totality of socially transmitted behavior patterns, arts, beliefs,

institutions, and all other products of human work and thought. These
patterns, traits, and products considered as the expression of a
particular period, class, community, or population.

doomed

Destined to an unhappy end.

exploitation

Utilization of another person or group for selfish purposes.

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Glossary
Imperialism

State policy, practice, or advocacy of extending power and dominion,

especially by direct territorial acquisition or by gaining political and
economic control of other areas. Because it always involves the use of
power, whether military force or some subtler form, imperialism has
often been considered morally reprehensible and the term is frequently
employed in international propaganda to denounce and discredit an
opponent's foreign policy.

industrialism

An economic and social system based on the development of largescale industries and marked by the production of large quantities of
inexpensive manufactured goods and the concentration of employment
in urban factories.

ingenuity

inventive skill or imagination.

insolent

Presumptuous and insulting in manner or speech.

insular

Circumscribed and detached in outlook and experience; narrow or

provincial.

Machine Age

The Machine Age is a term associated mostly with the early 20th
century, sometimes also including the late 19th century. An
approximate dating would be about 1880 to 1945. Considered to be at
a peak in the time between the first and second world wars, it forms a
late part of the Industrial Age. By the mid to late 1940s, the atom
bomb, the first computers, and the transistor came into being,
beginning the contemporary era of high technology and thus ending the
intellectual model of the machine age founded in the mechanical and
heralding a new more complex model of high-technology.

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Glossary
militarism

Militarism is defined as the belief or desire of a government or people

that a country should maintain a strong military capability and be
prepared to use it aggressively to defend or promote national interests.
Alternative definitions include "aggressiveness that involves the threat
of using military force", the "glorification of the ideals of a
professional military class" and the "predominance of the armed forces
in the administration or policy of the state".
Militarism has been a significant element of the imperialist or
expansionist ideologies of several nations throughout history.
Prominent examples include the Ancient Assyrian Empire, the Greek
city state of Sparta, the Roman Empire, the Aztec nation, the Kingdom
of Prussia, the British Empire, the Empire of Japan, the Russian Soviet
Federative Socialist Republic (which would later become part of the
Soviet Union), the Italian Colonial Empire during the reign of Benito
Mussolini, Nazi Germany and American Imperialism.
After World War II, militarism appeared in many of the post-colonial
nations of Asia (i.e. North Korea, Myanmar and Thailand) and Africa
(i.e. Liberia, Nigeria and Uganda). Militarist regimes also emerged in
Latin America; some, such as the right-wing administration of Augusto
Pinochet in Chile, gained power in coups through U.S. support, while
others, such as the leftist Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, were elected.

minister to

To give help to someone who needs it.

movement

A series of actions and events taking place over a period of time and
working to foster a principle or policy.

oppressed

A group of people who are oppressed are treated unfairly or cruelly

and are prevented from having the same rights as other people have.

Past and Present

Past and Present is a book by Thomas Carlyle. It was published in

April 1843 in England and the following month in the United States. It
combines medieval history with criticism of 19th-century British
society. Carlyle wrote it in seven weeks as a respite from the harassing
labor of writing Cromwell. He was inspired by the recently published
Chronicles of the Abbey of Saint Edmund's Bury, which had been
written by Jocelin of Brakelond at the close of the 12th century. This
account of a medieval monastery had taken Carlyle's fancy, and he
drew upon it in order to contrast the monks' reverence for work and
heroism with the sham leadership of his own day.

Peking

Beijing

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Glossary
perspective

The relationship of aspects of a subject to each other and to a whole.

Roman Empire

An empire that succeeded the Roman Republic during the time of

Augustus, who ruled from 27 B.C. to A.D. 14. At its greatest extent it
encompassed territories stretching from Britain and Germany to North
Africa and the Persian Gulf. After 395 it was split into the Byzantine
Empire and the Western Roman Empire, which rapidly sank into
anarchy under the onslaught of barbarian invaders from the north and
east. The last emperor of the West, Romulus Augustulus (born c. 461),
was deposed by Goths in 476, the traditional date for the end of the
empire.

salvage

To save from loss or destruction

solvents

Capable of dissolving another substance.

Spain

In 711 Muslim Arabs invaded Spain from North Africa and defeated
the Visigothic ruler, King Roderick. They quickly conquered almost
the entire peninsula and established Muslim states in Spain that were
to last until 1492.

T'ang Dynasty

Pinyin Tang (618907), Chinese dynasty that succeeded the shortlived Sui dynasty and developed a successful form of government and
administration on the Sui model and stimulated a cultural and artistic
flowering that amounted to a golden age.

the Dark Ages

The early medieval period of western European history. Specifically,

the term refers to the time (476800) when there was no Roman (or
Holy Roman) emperor in the West; or, more generally, to the period
between about 500 and 1000, which was marked by frequent warfare
and a virtual disappearance of urban life. It is now rarely used by
historians because of the value judgment it implies. Though sometimes
taken to derive its meaning from the fact that little was then known
about the period, the term's more usual and pejorative sense is of a
period of intellectual darkness and barbarity.

Vasco da Gama

Gama, Vasco da,

born c. 1460, , Sines, Port.
died Dec. 24, 1524, Cochin, India
Portuguese navigator whose voyages to India (149799, 150203,
1524) opened up the sea route from western Europe to the East by way
of the Cape of Good Hope and thus ushered in a new era in world
history. He also helped make Portugal a world power.

virulent

Bitterly hostile or antagonistic; hateful

vitiate

To make something less effective or spoil it.

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