The three ideas of interest in Lecture 7 included the Americans’ patience, ignorance of the British, and the significance of collaboration in overseeing the American Revolution’s success. During the First Continental Congress, the Americans did not aim to gain independence from their colonizers. Instead, they focused on amending the policies they deemed oppressive. Moreover, the British colonizers’ ignorance of the Americans’ pleas motivated the war, leading to many deaths. However, the lecture made me acknowledge that the Americans’ collaboration with international parties, such as France, boosted their efforts to gain independence from their oppressors (Davidson, 2017). Notably, many sources exist to enhance the historians’ understanding of these events.
The video by The Atlantic illustrates the history books’ failure to address the American Revolution’s complexity and the United States’ founding. According to the video by The Atlantic (2017), “History books tend to simplify the complex reality of the war in the country’s founding” (0.07-0-0.12)/ For instance, the video posted by The Atlantic (2017) indicates that “British students spend far more time in focusing on the economic impacts of losing India in 1947 as opposed to losing America over a hundred and seventy years earlier” (0.44-0.55). The information included herein indicates that the founders, such as Thomas Jefferson and George Washington, focused on satisfying their selfish interests. The narrator claims, “many of the founders were actually slave owners with incentives to push for the abolition of slavery” (The Atlantic, 2017, 2.08-2.14). Although the French assisted the Americans during the war, the narrator narrates, in The Atlantic (2017) “the war was a proxy one, quit of a larger clash between England and France” (1.08-1.12). Thus, the content of this short video is key to understanding the complex topic.
References
Davidson, J. W. (2017). US: A Narrative History, combined volume 1 and volume 2. [Yuzu]. Web.
The Atlantic. (2017). Myths from American history class [Video]. YouTube.