Ibn and Marco in Ch 22

I think Ibn and Marco were atypical of the people from their time period. In the maps, their travels cover Europe, Asia and Africa. The sheer quantity and distance of their travels are atypical. During their time period, a single person would not travel that far. First of all, they would have no reason to and secondly, there would not be easy ways to travel that far. Good or trade items may pass from one end of the world to the other end, but through many middlemen. Wether Ibn and Marco traveled for trade or not, or for trade and other reasons, this amount of travel was a typical to their time period.
Ibn and Marco's are still atypical of the people now a days. They are less atypical, but still different. A typical person of this time period would not travel that extensively, and if someone were a world traveler, they'd travel the whole world, not just Europe, Africa and Asia. Another interesting aspect is the type of transportation; now a days it would be more likely that these travels would be made by plane, and thus Ibn and Marco's land and sea route are atypical.

Map of Oceania

The Crusades Project: 0 days left...

I choose to display my understanding of the Muslim perspective on the Crusades with this representation of a Muslim family because it makes sense that if I can show how a Muslim would describe a crusade and their reaction to it, then I have shown my understanding of the topic. This choice included problems with making the family work. How could three family members be at three different crusades and still be a part of the same family? What reasons did these Muslims have to travel? These questions provoked the bit of creativity in me to create a story (like the African griots!) Some of this project did not go exactly as I envisioned... Known as the video part. As I recorded the different parts of the video and began to review each part, I realized that I might be limiting my audience's understanding due to the lack of clarity... Well... I tried my best. That is all.

Click here for my project!

The Crusades Project: Works Cited

"The Children's Crusade." The Children's Crusade. HistoryLearningSite.co.uk, n.d. Web. 10 Jan. 2013. < http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/childrens_crusade.htm >.

"Crusades." Gale Student Resources in Context. Detroit: Gale, 2010. Gale Student Resources In Context. Web. 10 Jan. 2013.

MacLehose, William F. "A Tender Age" Gutenberg-e.org. Columbia University Press, n.d. Web. < http://www.gutenberg-e.org/maclehose/maw04.html >.

Rickard J. "Sixth Crusade, 1228-1229." Sixth Crusade, 1228-1229. N.p., 24 Mar. 2001. Web. 10 Jan. 2013. < http://www.historyofwar.org/articles/wars_crusade6th.html >.

Robinson, Richard M. "Fourth Crusade." History Net Where History Comes Alive World US History Online Fourth Crusade Comments. N.p., 31 July 2006. Web. 10 Jan. 2013. < http://www.historynet.com/fourth-crusade.htm >.

"The Sixth Crusade." The Sixth Crusade. Joax, 28 Nov. 2008. Web. 10 Jan. 2013. < http://www.medievality.com/sixth-crusade.html >.

The Crusades Project: Comments

Hi Tim,
I noticed that you are working on the Peace Crusade like me. I hope you had better luck than me in finding information about it. At first, results popped up that were not related to the Peace Crusade, rather about other crusades for peace. If you add the year 1229 to the search, the results are more relevant. Here's a link (http://www.historyofwar.org/articles/wars_crusade6th.html) to a concise article that even includes how to cite it (bonus!). Good luck with your rage comics and don't be afraid to create your own rage faces.
Sam Lee

Hi Lawrence,
I'm working on the Peace Crusade and the Children's Crusade too! Sounds like a good plan to go with a diverse set of crusades to show the most understanding of the Muslim's perspective on the Crusades.
Sam Lee

Hi Allie and Becki, (I commented on Allie's comment on Becki's blog post)
I’m working with the Peace Crusade too! Another helpful hint to finding information about it is to add the year 1229 to your search keyword, it yields more relavent information.
Sam Lee

Hi Pearl,
I’m also working on the Children’s Crusade. Here’s a link that might be helpful. http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/childrens_crusade.htm
Prezzi presentations are lots of fun! Their user interface is mostly intuitive and with more experience you’ll learn to love them.
Sam Lee

The Crusades Project: 1 day left

Researching that should've began long before... -.- Per Mr. Whitten's recommendation of sweetsearch.com, I began my research on that search engine then compared it to results in google. I found that sweetsearch.com generally has more credible sources than google. This helps in the credibility of my project and the correctness of the information that I used to create my script. During research, the main problem I encountered was finding direct relevant information about the crusades that included the impact they had on the Muslims.

The Crusades Project: 4 days left

If my idea works... I plan on focusing on #5 Fourth Crusade (1201-1204), #6 Children's Crusade (1212), and #8 Peace Crusade (1229). These crusades occurred relatively close to each other and there's a good chance that a Muslim family may have experienced all three crusades. My idea is to have a script and potentially a video(cartoon?) of a Muslim family gathering where they talk about the crusades. The idea is to have a family of three: a father(for the Fourth Crusade), a mother(for the Children's Crusade) and a son(for the Peace Crusade). To make this work, the first step is to research, figure out how each member of the family could have been in the "right place at the right time" to get the "average" Muslim view of each crusade.

The Crusades Project: 7 days left

Funny how people desire freedom, then when they get it, they don't know what to do with it. For now, I have read and reread the "rules" or instructions for this Crusades Project and with these rules in mind I will be prepared to tackle what lies before me. My plan is to find out about these crusades then determine the best medium for demonstrating my understanding of the
Muslim perspective of the Crusades.

Bias Authors: Map of Africa

This textbook's map makers choose to represent Africa in the way that they did, with an minimal key, inaccuracies, and lacking religion, because they were biased and only showed their perspective, of a poor needy Africa that is isolated from the world. The map makers probably didn't give it a better key because they thought what they had was sufficient. Not all kingdoms are given color and space possibly because they thought some kingdoms more important than others (or they began at the top of the map and never finished...) Religion isn't shown because of the difficulties that come with showing religion. In a given region not everyone will have the same belief, and even if they do all have the same belief, the time period of the belief would have to be considered as well. This omission of information especially in the area of trade routes, which should be in and out to many other countries, reinforces the stereotypical American's view of Africa as a poor, needy, isolated Africa. After adding information to the map, our understanding of Africa is closer to the reality.

The Medium for My Story

Ideally a picture book. Yes, those books with pictures (and some words) that we used to love when we were little kids. Why did we love them? That would be because they captured our attention and told a story, with colors and images, that was easy to comprehend and remember. That's the way I would like my story to be remembered. This is a combination of the style of the griots of Africa and a boring textbook; I would have the interesting factor with the pictures and a few words like the boring textbooks to go with the pictures. I would prefer a mix of the two methods because I think there are pros to each method; the pictures can be understood by every nationality and a picture is worth a thousand words, then the words can provide more depth.

PostClassical Map of Africa