Signature Assignment

Caleb Hanson

Due: December 10th, 2017

BUS 1050

Personal Renaissance

The Renaissance refers to a period when Europe had a rebirth of roman era philosophy and

art. In recent times this has meant that the post roman era was somehow a darker period in history.

When taken into context this sentiment isnt entirely accurate.

The Roman republic and later empire receives a good amount of credit for being technologically

advanced and cultured for its time. In many areas this is true however often this time is overly

romanticized by many because of the philosophy and art that took place. Unfortunately, many fail to

take the entirety of the romans into account. The romans were ruthless conquerors who subjugated or

enslaved hundreds of thousands if not millions of people. The Roman empire essentially took a business

approach to its conquests. For those that were conquered they were left with essentially two options.

Either continue their lives in servitude to the empire by paying involuntary taxes or resist and become a

slave or killed. To sweeten the deal, they gave the conquered the ability to join the military in the hopes

that when they retired they might become a roman citizen with their own piece of land.

This type of control over their lands allowed the romans to have access to a diverse amount of

resources and trade helping to further expand the wealth and land of the empire. It is because of the

subjugation of hundreds of thousands of people that the Romans were wealthy enough to become

highly literate and focus on furthering technological advancements and discovering finer art.

The period after the roman empire is immediately thought to be a lesser civilization than there

was before. In reality the wealth was just distributed by a multitude of different powers and because of

this decentralization the type of luxuries associated with superpowers did not exist. In fact, it was
because of the romans that Europe became the place it was in the feudal era. Originally Europe was a

land largely inhabited by Barbarians, Gauls and Celtics. Over time Roman generals, like Julius Caeser

started to invade Europe. Often, they would arrange contracts with roman friendly tribes to help gain

territory. Eventually these tribes started to adopt Romanesque principals and became more civilized.

You can even argue the romans helped to establish the type of structure that thrived

throughout the dark ages, feudalism. In the roman empire you had to serve the military to become a

citizen if you were from a conquered land. Upon your retirement you were given a lot of land and

usually in tern several slaves, essentially making you a noble. This type of structure was just adopted on

a smaller/independent scale with free peasants instead of slaves.

There are however two aspects I agree with in terms of referring the medieval era as Dark

Ages. The first aspect is the control the orthodox church had on Europe. In the beginning of early

Christianity, you had two groups the Gnostics and the Orthodox Christians. The Gnostics had a wide

variety of beliefs but what stood out was its free thinking culture. They essentially morphed Greek

philosophy with Christianity. People took turns prophesying and discussing the meaning of morals and

values, even the woman could be prophets. On the other hand, the orthodox church was a mechanism

of corruption and power. Both takes on Christianity were in a power struggle however the orthodox

Christians were a united force and were able to make their way into the Roman government. With this

new power the church forced their opinion and thoughts onto others. If you did disagree you were killed

and labeled as a heretic. This type of closed mindedness made it hard for any groundbreaking scientific

discoveries. The second aspect, something I learned from this course, was that the church/government

was highly regulatory because of the moral issues they associated with capital gains and usury,

innovations in business were discouraged.

 Ultimately it was from society removing themselves from church control and adopting the

virtues of capitalism that Europe entered into the Renaissance. Capitalism increased the demand for

trade and international communications creating the first true middle class arguably ever seen, at least

in Europe. This growth associated from capitalism instead of genocidal empires allowed people to once

again focus on intellect instead of survival.

I do think its important to point out however that not all was bad during the dark ages

especially in other parts of the world. During this time was when Islam was recently introduced into the

world and from a more united middle east a lot of scientific and mathematical discoveries were made. In

addition, history was just not recorded as well in this period as it was with the romans. There may have

been plenty of advancements that are just not associated with this time frame. Labeling this era as dark

is just not true.

When it comes to me I also have some issues with renaissance being a termed associated with

me going to college. As with many things there is never one source, knowledge is no exception. Arguably

my experience at Discover Card has given me more knowledge than college ever has/will. School in

general is very theoretical, this is truer in college. Believe it or not I love to learn, whether its

documentaries, podcasts or books. I utilize them all in my spare time. Knowledge is more readily

available than at any other time and I try to take advantage of that.

In addition to this a renaissance being the term for rebirth would mean that I have died in my

intellectual knowledge and that college was necessary for that revival. I respectfully disagree with that

assumption. After high school I did take a break however I learned a great deal. With my current

employer I went from taking phone calls to management, then to analytics. Over time I learned SQL,

SASS, HTML5, CSS etc. I designed my own databases and applications for employees and now currently

doing projects that are presented to the CEO. The amount of communication, management,
organizational and collaborative skills I have learned through employment is way more than I could ever

learn in school. The one aspect of schooling that I have cherished the most is actually the nonstop

political rhetoric. It was in school that the differences in political theologies was thoroughly explained

and I was able to understand the factors that affect society the most. I have always been into politics

and college became a great progression in my knowledge on the subject. Even in this class I would argue

90% of the discussion was more politically geared then business. On principal this was extremely

annoying to me at first, but Ive come to accept the fact that politics runs everything, even business.

I know a lot of people that havent necessarily receded but have stunted their intellectual

growth. I would say that this is a tragedy because it makes them blind to the factors that affect them the

most. However, my interest isnt about school giving them their renaissance because I think ultimately

the culture of our society needs to change. We have entered into an era similar to that of the dark ages.

Not in terms of scientific advancements but theological ones. The established government of our time

has encouraged tribal mentality over critical thought and indoctrination to party ideology is rampant in

educational and media outlets. This type of dark age style of thought is difficult to overcome however

because it isnt necessarily forced but instead coerced into the minds of the masses. The only way to

over come this and bring in our own renaissance is through promoting critical thinking and non-

conformity.

In summary renaissance to me is more of a continual drive for knowledge and critical thought,

no matter what source that might be. Work, Technology and School have been crucial to my gradual

increase in these attributes.