United Grade 10 AP World History: Modern
Chapters: 9
1. The Global Tapestry
Developments in East Asia from c. 1200 to c. 1450 · Developments in Dar al-Islam from c. 1200 to c. 1450 · Developments in South and Southeast Asia from c. 1200 to c. 1450 · State Building in the Americas · State Building in Africa · Developments in Europe from c. 1200 to c. 1450 · Comparison in the Period from c. 1200 to c. 1450
- Trade Networks of the World, c. 1200–1450 – Between about 1200 and 1450, three great networks linked Afro-Eurasia: the overland Silk Roads, the sea routes of the Indian Ocean and the camel routes across the Sahara. Trade grew because regions had different goods, new technology made travel safer and cheaper, and strong states (the Song and Ming in China, the Mongol Empire, Mali, the Swahili city-states and Muslim sultanates) protected merchants. Along these routes moved not only silk, spices, gold and salt, but also religions, technologies, crops and disease. Meanwhile, states in East Asia, Dar al-Islam, South and Southeast Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas grew in their own ways.
2. Networks of Exchange
The Silk Roads · The Mongol Empire and the Making of the Modern World · Exchange in the Indian Ocean · Trans-Saharan Trade Routes · Cultural Consequences of Connectivity · Environmental Consequences of Connectivity · Comparison of Economic Exchange
- Trade Networks of the World, c. 1200–1450 – Between about 1200 and 1450, three great networks linked Afro-Eurasia: the overland Silk Roads, the sea routes of the Indian Ocean and the camel routes across the Sahara. Trade grew because regions had different goods, new technology made travel safer and cheaper, and strong states (the Song and Ming in China, the Mongol Empire, Mali, the Swahili city-states and Muslim sultanates) protected merchants. Along these routes moved not only silk, spices, gold and salt, but also religions, technologies, crops and disease. Meanwhile, states in East Asia, Dar al-Islam, South and Southeast Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas grew in their own ways.
- Nomadic Empires: the Mongols under Genghis Khan – The Mongols were pastoral nomads of the Central Asian steppe. They herded animals and moved with the seasons. In 1206 Temujin united the Mongol and Turkic tribes and was named Genghis Khan. He organised a strong army on a decimal system, a fast horse-relay post (yam) and a code of rules (yasa). His sons and grandsons built the largest land empire the world had seen, from China to eastern Europe, and then split it into four khanates. People remember Genghis Khan very differently: as a destroyer, as a national hero who united his people, and as the maker of safe roads that linked Asia and Europe.
3. Land-Based Empires
Empires Expand · Empires: Administration · Empires: Belief Systems · Comparison in Land-Based Empires
- Land-Based Empires (1450–1750): Expansion, Rule, Belief and Comparison – An empire is one centre ruling many peoples and lands. From 1450 to 1750 the Ottoman, Safavid, Mughal and Qing empires grew with gunpowder armies, ran their lands with paid officials and land taxes, and used religion and monuments to show their right to rule.
4. Transoceanic Interconnections
Technological Innovations from 1450 to 1750 · Exploration: Causes and Events from 1450 to 1750 · Columbian Exchange · Maritime Empires Established · Maritime Empires Maintained and Developed · Internal and External Challenges to State Power from 1450 to 1750 · Changing Social Hierarchies from 1450 to 1750 · Continuity and Change from 1450 to 1750
- Colonization: How European Empires Spread Across the World (1450–1750) – Colonization means one country takes control of land far away, sends its people or officials there and uses the land, its people and its goods for its own gain. From about 1450 to 1750 European powers (Spain, Portugal, Britain, France and the Netherlands) built empires across the oceans. In the Americas, diseases and conquest destroyed many native societies; the Spanish ran a strict labour system and a social ladder; Britain built settler colonies such as the thirteen colonies; and millions of Africans were forced across the Atlantic in the slave trade. In Asia, Europeans mostly built trading posts, which later grew into empires, as in India.
5. Revolutions
The Enlightenment · Nationalism and Revolutions in the Period from 1750 to 1900 · Industrial Revolution Begins · Industrialization Spreads in the Period from 1750 to 1900 · Technology of the Industrial Age · Industrialization: Government's Role from 1750 to 1900 · Economic Developments and Innovations in the Industrial Age · Reactions to the Industrial Economy from 1750 to 1900 · Society and the Industrial Age · Continuity and Change in the Industrial Age
- The Age of Revolutions (c. 1770–1850) – Between about 1770 and 1850, people in the Americas and Europe overthrew or challenged kings, colonial rulers and old privileges. New ideas of liberty, equality and rights met real problems: unfair taxes, debt, hunger and slavery. The American Revolution (1776) created a republic with a written constitution. The French Revolution (1789) ended feudal privilege and declared the rights of citizens. The wave spread to Haiti, Latin America and Europe in 1848. Kings pushed back at Vienna in 1815, but ideas of citizenship, constitutions and the nation lasted.
- The Rise of Nationalism in Europe – Before 1789, Europe was split into many kingdoms and people were loyal to a king. The French Revolution said power belongs to the people, who form one nation. Napoleon spread equal laws. After 1815 kings came back, but liberals, romantic writers and hungry common people pushed for nation-states in 1830 and 1848. Germany (1871) and Italy (1861) were built by joining many small states. Nations were shown as women figures like Marianne and Germania. By 1914, nationalism mixed with imperial rivalry, and the Balkans tension led to the First World War.
- The Age of Industrialisation – Before factories, merchants gave raw material to peasant families who spun and wove at home (proto-industrialisation). From the 1760s Britain built cotton mills, machines like the spinning jenny and James Watt's improved steam engine. Change was slow: hand labour stayed cheap and common. In India, weavers once supplied world markets; the East India Company controlled them through gomasthas, and Manchester cloth later flooded India. From 1854 Indian mills grew in Bombay and elsewhere, and small workshops also grew. Makers sold goods through labels, calendars and adverts, and swadeshi adverts appealed to national pride.
6. Consequences of Industrialization
Rationales for Imperialism from 1750 to 1900 · State Expansion from 1750 to 1900 · Indigenous Responses to State Expansion from 1750 to 1900 · Global Economic Development from 1750 to 1900 · Economic Imperialism from 1750 to 1900 · Causes of Migration in an Interconnected World · Effects of Migration · Causation in the Imperial Age
- Imperialism: Why Empires Grew and How People Resisted – Imperialism is when a powerful state takes control over other lands and peoples, by war, treaties or money. Colonialism is one form: ruling a colony directly. Between about 1870 and 1914 ('New Imperialism') industrial powers raced for colonies in Africa, Asia and the Pacific. They wanted raw materials, markets, places to invest, ports and prestige, and excused it with racist ideas. Control grew from trading posts to unequal treaties to full colonies. The colonies were drained: raw materials left cheap, factory goods came back, local industry fell. People resisted with revolts, reforms and mass movements, and most colonies were free by the 1970s. The borders and inequalities left behind still shape the world.
7. Global Conflict
Shifting Power After 1900 · Causes of World War I · Conducting World War I · Economy in the Interwar Period · Unresolved Tensions After World War I · Causes of World War II · Conducting World War II · Mass Atrocities After 1900 · Causation in Global Conflict
- World War II (1939–1945) – World War II was the deadliest war in history. Its roots were the anger left by World War I, the Great Depression and the rise of dictators in Germany, Italy and Japan. It began when Germany invaded Poland on 1 September 1939. The Axis (Germany, Italy, Japan) fought the Allies (Britain and its empire, France, the USSR, the USA, China and others). It was a total war and a war of annihilation: about 6 million Jews were murdered in the Holocaust and 70–85 million people died. Germany surrendered in May 1945 and Japan in September 1945. The war led to the United Nations, the Cold War and the end of empires.
8. Cold War and Decolonization
Setting the Stage for the Cold War and Decolonization · The Cold War · Effects of the Cold War · Spread of Communism After 1900 · Decolonization After 1900 · Newly Independent States · Global Resistance to Established Power Structures After 1900 · End of the Cold War · Causation in the Age of the Cold War and Decolonization
- The Cold War (1945–1991) – The Cold War was a long contest (1945–1991) between two superpowers: the USA with its Western allies (capitalism, multi-party elections) and the USSR with its Eastern allies (communism, one-party rule). They never fought each other directly. Instead they formed rival alliances (NATO, Warsaw Pact), raced to build nuclear weapons and reach space, backed opposite sides in proxy wars (Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan) and came close to nuclear war in Cuba in 1962. Many new nations, led by India and others, stayed non-aligned. Détente eased tension in the 1970s. Reforms in the USSR, the fall of the Berlin Wall (1989) and the break-up of the USSR (1991) ended it.
9. Globalization
Advances in Technology and Exchange After 1900 · Technological Advances and Limitations After 1900: Disease · Technological Advances: Debates About the Environment After 1900 · Economics in the Global Age · Calls for Reform and Responses After 1900 · Globalized Culture After 1900 · Resistance to Globalization After 1900 · Institutions Developing in a Globalized World · Continuity and Change in a Globalized World
- The Making of a Global World – People, goods, ideas and germs have moved across the world for thousands of years: on the silk routes, with food crops like potato and maize, and with diseases like smallpox. Between 1815 and 1914 the world economy grew through three flows: goods, labour and capital, helped by railways, steamships and refrigerated ships. Colonies paid a price: rinderpest in Africa and indentured labour from India. After the First World War came mass production in the USA and then the Great Depression of 1929, which hit India's farmers hard. After 1945, the Bretton Woods system, the IMF and the World Bank rebuilt the world economy.