Blog Entry #6

How would an Athenian of the 5th Century BCE criticize our present-day representative democracy? (or.... how would they approve of it?

An Athenian of the 5th Century would say to our present-day representative that their ways are unruly. In our present-day government, we have one person to decide and rule over us. In Athenian democracy they have more than one person to rule, distribution of power; A president for 3 months then they would switch off. The Athenians would criticize this method because the person in power could be corrupt and nobody could do anything about it because he was already elected and for 4 years a that. In Athenian democracy it would three months and nobody could mess anything that much. The Athenians would approve of the idea that everyone is equal, even if they are not wealthy. Overall they would approve of the present-day democracy, because it's a democracy and everyone is equal, and that everyone is allowed to have a say in something that is happening in their city.

Mayan Values Exemplified in Modern Society

Many mayan values are exemplified in modern society today. As I have learned from my classmates presentations there is a lot of examples of Mayans in modern society. We take a lot of their findings and ideas and we took from it and expanded on it. It was basically the foundation of our life. For example, ball games. The Mayans played a game that is very similar to basketball. The game had a hoop, a court, stands, and a team. Another example is food. Mexican food and chocolate is some things from Mayan that really stand out to me in the modern society. I know that a lot of people like chocolate and a lot of people like Mexican food. There are many different Mexican restaurants and many varieties of chocolate. This shows how we expanded on the Mayans findings. We also have architecture, religion, the calendar. It is hard to imagine if the Mayans weren't in existence on this world, because if they weren't here we might not have had all these great things in our society.