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cahnBackground: The kids' school has a topic for "Unit" every trimester that a lot of their work (reading, writing, some math) revolves around. These topics range from time/geographic periods ('Colonial America') to geography ('Asia') to science ('Space') to social science ('Business and Economics'). (I have some issues with this way of doing things, but that's a whole separate post.) Anyway, for Reasons, they have had to come up with a new topic this year, and E's 7/8 class is doing "World Fairs" as their new topic.
Me: I know E's teacher is all about World Fairs and I know she is great and will do a good job. But I feel like if we had a different teacher who wasn't so into World Fairs, they wouldn't do such a good job and another topic would be better.
Me: Like... the Enlightenment!
D: Heh, you could teach that! But you'd have to restrain yourself from making everything about Frederick the Great.
Me: But that's the thing! Everyone does relate to each other in this time period! Voltaire -- and his partner Émilie du Châtelet, who was heavily involved in the discourse of conservation of energy and momentum -- well, I've told you Voltaire had a thing with Fritz -- and then there's Empress Maria Theresa, who went to war with him a few times -- and Catherine the Great --
D, meditatively: You know --
Me: *am innocently not warned even though this is the same tone of voice that is often followed by, say, a bad pun*
D: -- it's impressive how everyone from this 'the Great' family is so famous!
Me: *splutters*
D, thoughtfully: But of course there's probably selection bias, as the ones who aren't famous don't get mentioned. You never see 'Bob the Great' in the history books...
Me: *splutters more*
Me: I know E's teacher is all about World Fairs and I know she is great and will do a good job. But I feel like if we had a different teacher who wasn't so into World Fairs, they wouldn't do such a good job and another topic would be better.
Me: Like... the Enlightenment!
D: Heh, you could teach that! But you'd have to restrain yourself from making everything about Frederick the Great.
Me: But that's the thing! Everyone does relate to each other in this time period! Voltaire -- and his partner Émilie du Châtelet, who was heavily involved in the discourse of conservation of energy and momentum -- well, I've told you Voltaire had a thing with Fritz -- and then there's Empress Maria Theresa, who went to war with him a few times -- and Catherine the Great --
D, meditatively: You know --
Me: *am innocently not warned even though this is the same tone of voice that is often followed by, say, a bad pun*
D: -- it's impressive how everyone from this 'the Great' family is so famous!
Me: *splutters*
D, thoughtfully: But of course there's probably selection bias, as the ones who aren't famous don't get mentioned. You never see 'Bob the Great' in the history books...
Me: *splutters more*
Re: 1764-1772 Foreign policy: Russia: The Russo-Turkish War, 1768-1774
Date: 2024-01-07 11:31 am (UTC)Reminder that Voltaire was all for it and thought that Fritz should help her doing it. Mainly because he saw the Ottoman Empire as the worst in terms of human rights (especially for women), beating out Russia, France and the Vatican combined.
Re: the naming, calling her oldest grandchild "Alexander" doesn't speak of humble ambitions, either. (Especially as he was the first Alexander on the Russian throne, this was not going back to a tradition.)
BTW ,it's something you can quiz not just foreign tourists but Germans with: whom is the Alexanderplatz in Berlin named after? (Because there obviously was no Prussian king called Alexander, and while there were some German Dukes like Goethe's bff who had Alexander as one of their names - i.e. Carl Alexander - they couldn't be the naming reason, either, or else the full name would have been used. And said square is, in fact, named after Catherine's grandson, Czar Alexander, for his help to Prussia in the Napoleonic wars.
Re: 1764-1772 Foreign policy: Russia: The Russo-Turkish War, 1768-1774
Date: 2024-01-07 11:34 am (UTC)Haha, salon hive mind is strong today; you and I are typing up the same posts at the same time! :D
Re: the naming, calling her oldest grandchild "Alexander" doesn't speak of humble ambitions, either. (Especially as he was the first Alexander on the Russian throne, this was not going back to a tradition.
Very true.
nd while there were some German Dukes like Goethe's bff who had Alexander as one of their names - i.e. Carl Alexander
I thought it was Carl August?
And said square is, in fact, named after Catherine's grandson, Czar Alexander, for his help to Prussia in the Napoleonic wars.
Cool, I had been to the Alexanderplatz but did not know who it was named after!
Re: 1764-1772 Foreign policy: Russia: The Russo-Turkish War, 1768-1774
Date: 2024-01-07 11:36 am (UTC)