9/8/08 - CH.4+6

I grew up very close to Canada and never was able to learn about its history. Chapter 4 was interesting to me for several reasons; I never knew much about what happened in Canada during the Revolutionary War, and how it came to be an abolitionist country. The second point that was brought up was the 'the cult of womanhood'. I think that it's interesting that the British were so adamant that women should be frail, submissive, etc. when there was so much work to be done. In reality, women were hard laborers working on the farms, teaching, cooking, mothering, etc. Not only were women a driving force for the economy at that time through their hard labour. When  talking about hard labour it's also very important to remember the Aboriginals. When they were no longer needed for their labour or indigenous commerce they were pushed out of their land by series of treaties and acts.     

In Chapter 6, I found it interesting in the discussion of ethnicity in Mexico. In the twentieth century the term 'mestizo'  was reconstructed therefore causing a 'fusion' of the ethnicities.  By doing this urbanization was embraced, the Spanish language was used, and heroes were acknowledged. My question is, was this to raise people's spirits and create proactive people to look up to. Of course this has something to do with some of the choices that were made, but is there an anterior motive to these changes than the obvious, by this I mean... who is benefiting from these changes?