Polyethnicity blog

Donald Creighton states that the major contributors to polyethnicity in the Old World were conquest, enslavement, disease, and trade. Conquest causes intermingling through the garrison of soldiers in the conquered towns. Disease could afflict serious drains on city populations. Two primary method of maintaining a population include immigration from the country sides or enslavement. Both of which could provide a steady flow of people into the to sustain a population equilibrium. Trade also spreads culture through merchants and goods from far off lands. These merchants even though of a different culture would integrate themselves into ethnic subdivisions of cities, thus furthering the polyethnicity and diversity of the town. Imported goods from foreign cultures can influence the way a society operates through the ways that those goods are used.

I find it interesting that some cultures preferred to be left to their own devices, rather than openly trading wares and ideas with the rest of the world. Up until the 1800s, Japan mostly secluded itself from the rest of the world, and was very successful in doing so. The Japanese were able to maintain a society of monoethnicity, that shows very little diversity even today. If I were to put myself in Japan's shoes, I would have been more open in sharing knowledge, ideas, and commodities with Chinese and Korean neighbors.

-Derek Leidemann