Professor Arturo Giraldez gave a lecture on the topic: “Global trade, global network and global history”

Professor Arturo Giraldez

This lecture addresses a new perspective on the study of global history: global exchange and globalization are stories rooted in history. The lecture focuses on the following key points:

Firstly, there were the geographical discoveries and the formation of international trade routes in the early modern period, from the mid-15th to the end of the 18th century. Secondly, there was the exploration of new lands, the formation of new communities, along with cultural exchange and intermingling of languages ​​and races. Professor Arturo Giraldez provided new information and insights on the issue of global exchange and interaction. Thirdly, there were trade routes and the formation of global economies. Professor Arturo Giraldez emphasized the role of the flow of monetary metals such as silver from the New World and the Americas to the East, transforming the socio-economic landscapes of the East. For example, he discussed how international exchange rates were adjusted and balanced across regions. While in the late 16th century, the exchange rates between gold and silver in Europe, China, and the New World and America were highly skewed, global exchange rates had become almost equal by the mid-17th century (specifically 1640).

The lecture also emphasized the formation of global consumption. National and local products such as tea, silk, and spices from China have become globally consumed goods, and Europeans consider tea drinking a cultural aspect of social life. Global trade has also led to interbreeding between different racial groups. For example, African slaves and European migrants to the Americas significantly altered the genetic map of the Americas. This also created cultural exchange as musical genres and art forms from different regions were widely shared. Interbreeding also transformed the world's population through the exchange of diseases, ecological changes, and other factors.

The students asked Professor Arturo Giraldez many excellent questions on topics such as: assessing the impact of trade flows on inflation; how the European price revolution of the late 16th and early 17th centuries directly affected the lives of Europeans; current trends in world currency metals as seen from historical experience; and predictions about the role and exchange rates of precious metals in modern times.

"Global trade, global network, and global history" is one of the three topics that Professor Arturo Giraldez discussed with faculty and students of the History Department recently.