Reference no: EM133237353

Assignment:

There are a lot of questions to think about concerning this chapter--I hardly know where to begin. Be sure to ask any questions YOU have or make any comments about this material that occur to you. I hope you find this material thought-provoking. The industrial revolution is fundamental to the shape of our world today, so study this chapter carefully.

1) How did women's roles and attitudes about women change due to industrialization? Think about this in terms of both urban and rural women as well as the different economic classes of women.

2) What do you think of the "robber barons"(like Rockefeller, Swift, and Carnegie)? Do you think these men of such enormous wealth are a sign of strength or of weakness in the American system? What about the recent examples of "robber barons" in the computer revolution of today? How do business leaders of today compare with those of the 19th century?

3) How did workers respond to industrialization? Is the "de-skilling" of work inevitable? Does it continue today? Was labor radicalism, even violence, appropriate in the late 19th century?

4) How did industrialization impact farmers? In what ways did farm life improve? In what ways did farm life worsen?

5) How did farmers treat the environment?

6) Do you think workers should unionize? Why did they seek to do so in the 19th century? Why did their efforts in the 19th century largely fail?

7) In this chapter, we see the wealthy class, the vast working class, and a small but growing middle class. Now politicians seem to tell us that we are almost all in the middle class. Why is this the case?

8) Is there a difference between the middle class and the middle income? What are some differences.