Where We Fall - The Collapse of our Civilizations

Throughout this module I have seen a great increase in a number of my communication skills.   Initial Opinions My first impressions were that this module would have some easier parts for me as an actor. I figured any sort of live communication or podcasting would not be too much of a challenge given my current skill set. However, I also knew that I was not familiar with blogging at all and knew that I was therefore lacking a lot of crucial knowledge. I was soon dissuaded of its difficulty through the provision of terrific resources during our lectures as well as the knowledge on how to use them effectively.   Pitch Feedback I learned two key points in my pitch feedback. Firstly my structure was not as well put together as I would have liked and did not stand up well under the pressure of presentation. This caused it to jump around and certain key points were either missed out or not given enough emphasis. This leads onto the next thing I learned which is that I n...

The aim of this blog is to create awareness of the circumstances around fallen civilizations. My original idea when creating it was that it would become a platform where people can acquire more understanding and better develop their knowledge of such events and what a collapse of our societies may look like or feel to be a part of. This inspection of societies on a grand scale and placing it into a fully contained blog has proved extremely influential in helping develop my own brand of communication online. My main improvement is that I have found a voice and style of writing and communicating online that feels natural to me. It is not overly academic nor is it too casual. I think this tone has allowed me to shape my online brand into being more accessible for both casual and invested readers. Finding a voice for communication is vital and this is my biggest improvement in terms of my personal, online brand and appearance. My second biggest takeaway from creating this blog is that ...

All of the following references are applicable to all posts prior to the 25/04/2022.  References -           Adibah Sulaiman, The Development of Civilization, its Value and Interaction, UTT1022 Islamic Civilization and Asian Civilization – Photo Post -        Andres Sundell, 1000 Years of European Borders overlaid on one map,   https://vividmaps.com/atlas-of-the-changing-borders-of-europe/   - Photo Post -           https://www.thoughtco.com/what-was-the-fall-of-rome-112688 - Fall of Rome Post -           Edward Gibbon, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 2010 – Fall of Rome Post -            Joshua J. Mark, Athens,  https://www.worldhistory.org/Athens/  - Video Post -            Paul Walter - Boud...

This is a timeline of all known empires, nations, and peoples that have existed across the world including how long they were around for. I believe it is a significant graphical representation of just how many times civilizations have risen and fallen over the millennia.  This second photo serves to underline just how much 1000 years of change in one region can look like. This is a map of European borders snapshotted and placed on one map over the span of 1000 years. It really serves to highlight that change, like time, is inexorable and nothing truly lasts forever, not even our greatest civilizational achievements. This table, discussing the factors that bring about the loss of a civilization, was written by Adibah Sulaiman. It mostly deals with how he perceives an Islamic or Asian Civilization being able to fall. With this view coming from a different culture than me there are still a number of factors that he highlights in this chart that are still universal to all humans. This ...

The fall of the ancient Bronze Age Mediterranean civilizations is one of the most intriguing yet curiously indecipherable areas of history. It is not entirely clear when the events that would lead to the fall of all but the strongest of these early peoples even began. It is believed to have really begun to occur not long after when the Trojan War is meant to have taken place in around 1100BC. Over the next century the intricate structure of trade and diplomacy that had been carefully woven in the region for the last millennia would all come unravelled  and would throw these seemingly advanced people's back into a time with little to no literacy or understanding of the complex societies they had come from. These times would become known as the Classical Dark Age. A time so dire that it would only be matched by the Early Medieval Ages of Western Europe nearly 1500 years later. The most famous factor for the fall of these incredibly powerful civilizations is simply and eerily known as...

The idea of the Roman Empire falling in one great apocalyptic battle or singular event, typically involving a furious horde of barbarians besieging the mighty marble-clad city of Rome is false. This Lord of the Rings style of grand battle is appealing to think about. However, just like J.R.R Tolkien’s work, it is a fantasy.   There are a number of crucial factors that led to the slow erosion and collapse of the Western Roman Empire. The official date for the fall of the Western Empire is the year 476AD. In this year the Gothic King Odoacer forced the last Western Roman Emperor, Romulus Augustulus, (an ironic name as the founder of Rome was also called Romulus) to abdicate. With Odoacer’s sack of the city there was no longer a central Roman senate or government and as such the remaining Roman states fractured and split into their own entities under Odoacer and later the Ostrogoth’s in Italy. This is the nearest to a singular event that dealt the final blow to an already weak...

I decided to research how civilizations fall and what that means to us in the modern world. The purpose of my research topic was to provide a source of information pertaining to the fall of civilizations and how this information can apply to the modern world.  The information about and around how human civilizations fall is important because it is not just a knowledge of the past but it is also a means of looking at where we as a species have weaknesses. From these weaknesses we can learn from the lessons of the past and therefore apply them to similar future situations. The research gathered is curated to bring to the fore some of the most relevant collapses of civilization with the fall of Athens providing an insight into how that ancient democracy could provide lessons to our increasingly democracy driven world. This city’s specific crumbling may not be as dramatic or as world changing as others such as the Western Roman Empire or the Han Empire, but it is relevant as a democra...

A podcast with Professor of Classics at the University of Edinburgh, Mirko Canevaro, discussing the fall of civilizations, the city-state of Athens and the modern perception of how a civilization falls. The podcast starts off with thoughts about why civilizations fall and what we can see appearing from that. Secondly and crucially we explore the idea of inheriting a 'fallen' civilization and finishing with a talk about how Athens and Athenian Democracy prove that defining the fall of a civilization so bluntly is not always the correct way to view these moments in history. It is a historiographical rather than an historical question.   Points Discussed:  - How civilizations fall?  - How do we define the fall of a civilization?  - Examples of people's inheriting their past civilizations. - How Athens fell. The podcast is 2:50 long and was made using DaVinci Resolve 17 and recorded via Zoom.

I have posted this video as an accompaniment to to the podcast with Professor of Classics Mirko Canevaro. This video will provide some basic but vital understanding of the fundamental features surrounding the rise and flourishing of the Classical Greek city-states.  This video focuses on Athens in particular due to its unique government being the first form of democracy ever seen. The video will also provide a backdrop that will help understand how this civilization eventually began to crumble and change which I discuss in much greater detail with Professor Canevaro in the podcast. The information is far from the most complete yet it is vital knowledge for anyone wishing to have a grasp of the history surrounding The Classical period in Ancient Greece.