OER: Open Educational Resources

This textbook is the first of four, and is designed to be used for Seneca College’s Development of Western Thought courses. It integrates text and images from a variety of open access sources, together with original material. Each chapter has both a chronological, geographic and thematic focus. That is to say, the chapters proceed approximately chronologically, but each chapter will usually focus on one or more specific regions or states that were significant during that time period, and will often use that focus to explore a more general theme that is relevant to the history of Western civilisation. So, for example, the second chapter of this textbook covers the time period from about 4000 to 2000 BCE, focuses on the region of Mesopotamia and Sumer specifically, and explores the themes of the emergence of cities and what constitutes civilization. In order to be as focused and readable as possible, this textbook omits much discussion of general political history — kings, conquests, the rise and fall of dynasties and empires. This is perhaps the main structural difference between it and other more traditional Western Civ textbooks: the emphasis is firmly on social and intellectual history, with history of technology and economic history included in a supplemental way.