The Last Exploration
The Idea of a Local Economy
As I was reading The Idea of a Local Economy, I found myself confused at some points with the terminology. Personally, I'm not one that is up to date or even acquainted with what's happening with the economy now, but I do my best to stay somewhat aware of it. Throughout the whole essay, I definitely found myself agreeing with hat Berry had to say, and his views. Living in Delaware, Ohio, I can really connect and agree with how he feels about local businesses, simply because we have so many here. Our downtown really thrives on it. We have businesses like Son of Thurman and the Bare Bowl, that really bring our community together. This also ensures that the money stays within our community as well. Berry says "Without prosperous local economies, the people have no power and the land no voice." (p.33) With a Walmart and McDonald's right down the road from our prosperous downtown, its scary at times that big business is only trying to break it down, and benefit for themselves. Like Brian says in his exploration, its extremely selfish of these businesses to do this only for their gain. It not only effects local business, but the environment as well, which is extremely alarming. Berry speaks the importance of this struggle in his essay, that I find very important.
My Own Thoughts
Something that I think is under appreciated in our society today is the appreciation for history, and everything that came before us. While many think this includes the long hour one spent in their history class learning about the Indians or the signing of the Declaration of Independence, that's not all it is. Being a history major, I may have a biased opinion to how interesting the subjects are but definitely not the importance that they have to our society now. If we take the time to look back, we can learn so much. Believe or not, history repeats itself in so many ways. We as a society often fail a second or third time because we don't take the time to look back and learn from the mistakes that those before us have made. For an example, if Adolph Hitler had taken the time to look back in history, he may have won the war (not a good thing in retrospect but for him it would have been). The tactic that brought Hitler's reign to an end was fighting a two front war against Russia. This caused his forces to be weak and easily taken down. Before his time, a man named Napoleon Bonaparte did the exact same thing, resulting to the end of his reign as well. It seems silly that we could fix a lot of problems in our society, or at least begin to, by simply looking back in time and taking notes from the mistakes those generations made in the same situation. Society in theory never really changes, it merely evolves. It's like we're in a test and we have the answer sheet in our hands but we choose not to use it. It doesn't have to be interesting but it is important that we know he significance that our history has to our society now.
I could not agree more with your thought of history being under appreciated. If only the world stopped to educate themselves on what happened in the past, it could save a repeat of horrible and preventable events. The saying "History repeats itself" could not be more true. Many do not go back and learn from the mistakes of others and it makes me so angry. If a child can learn from their mistakes why can't adults and world leaders?
ReplyDeleteI enjoy history as well. Especially WW2. What are you focusing on your major? (What type of history is your favorite?) It's crazy and intriguing to see how Hitler took power in Germany. His tactics and persuasion as well with him being well spoken and having passion in his discourse made him tantalizing to the German people. Of course he blamed minorities and The Jewish people for problems that plagued Germany and we both know what happened.
ReplyDeleteI absolutely agree with you. History should be taken in a much more serious matter. I know that if we can compare what happened in history to some of the events that have happened recently, we can prevent a lot of horrible things from happening. If we also take a closer look at history, we might be able to find information that will help us advance modern achievements. For example, sometime in Ancient Greece, a mathematician created a formula that was lost in history, and then was recreated by someone during the 19th century. If we retained that formula, technology could have advanced much further than it is right now.
ReplyDeleteI agree that history is starting to become highly undervalued. History is the basis for every fundamental thing that we know today. We learn the history and expand on it. How would we be able to expand if we didn't know what came first? I used to hate the subject of history when I was younger, but as I've gotten older, I have started to see the importance of it and have become really intrigued with what history actually is and how it constantly repeats itself, like you said. I love story telling, and history is basically just one giant story book.
ReplyDelete