Benjamin Shepard English Composition II

  Two weeks ago, my class was assigned the essay El Caribe Gris to read as a test of our ability to understand main ideas. El Caribe Gris is an essay originally written in Spanish that analyzes the writings of Christopher Columbus, Bartolome De las Casas, and Hernando Colon. From the very beginning of the essay’s English translation, it is made clear the essay was not meant to flatter Columbus, calling him “delusional” and small minded. The essay described how many of the records of the voyages were lost but a specific copy of the first voyage would be consequential in history, thanks to the annotations of De Las Casas, in which he contradicted many of Columbus’s writings and rewrote the colonial narrative. The essay was particularly difficult to read for a few reasons. First, the essay was originally written in Spanish and my copy was a translation. Often in translations, certain concepts can be lost due to a difference in language. Another difficulty came from an unclear deli...

  Please ignore the clutter My blogs meet all five criteria. Before I publish my posts, I pre-write them in a word document where I create the initial post, followed by editing and rewording in areas that may feel clunky. My last step is to plan my images and reference section. I then delete the images and copy the writing to blogger where I put the pictures back in and publish it. Altogether the process has taken me only a few hours per blog post and despite some early problems with my pictures, I think this system has worked well so far. I plan my blog posts by first reading the prompt/assignment after class ends. I then take the week to think about the assignment, decide how I want to interpret it and what points I want to cover so Tuesday morning when I go to write the post, I have very few issues and am able to type quickly, though as the expectations for these posts are raised, this system of pseudo-procrastination may prove to be ineffective. It does feel a little odd knowin...

Pedro de Heredia, Spanish Conquistador The earliest recorded history of Colombia dates back to about 1499 with the first Spanish conquest. Conquistador Alonso de Ojeda landed at Cabo de la Vela where he encountered the Muisca Confederation. A later expedition in 1533 led by Pedro de Heredia founded the first  permanent settlement of Cartagena. The Muisca Confederation was a nation of Amerindians located near what is now the city of Bogota. They had an economy largely based on agriculture and salt mining and would trade with other nearby tribes such as the Inca. The capital of the new colony, Colombia, Bogota, was founded in August of 1538 by Conquistador Jimenéz de Quesáda . The colony's main exports were gold and jewels mined through the forced labor of the Muisca people through the Encomienda system, a precursor to African slavery. In 1739 the Spanish holdings in the New World were reorganized and the Viceroyalty of New Granada Map of the  Viceroyalty of New Granada was form...