Age of Enlightenment	A period during the late 1600s and most of the 1700s when philosophers such as John Locke began to articulate ideas of personal sovereignty, meaning that all people have the natural rights of life, liberty, and property.
Alliance	A mutually beneficial relationship between two nations forged to further common interests or prevent attack from common enemies.
Anthropocene Epoch	A new epoch, not formally accepted by geologists, during which our species has become the dominant force for change in the biosphere. The Anthropocene marks the end of the Holocene epoch, about the time of the Industrial Revolution, 200 years ago.
Artisan	A person who is skilled at a craft such as pottery or weaving.
Biosphere	The entire network of life on Earth; the region of Earth in which living organisms can be found.
Blitzkrieg	A German tactic used during World War II that combined the quick movement of troops and tanks with massive attacks from the air.
Capitalism	A competitive economic system in which products and production means are owned by individuals or private groups.
Climate Change	Measurable changes in the climate over long periods of time.
Collective Learning	The ability to share, preserve, and build upon ideas over time.
Colonialism	The rule of one territory and its people by an occupying population from different territory, often for economic gain.
Commerce	The large-scale buying and selling of goods and services.
Communications	The technologies, including speech, writing, printing, and the Internet, by which people exchange information and ideas.
Communism	A system of government or social organization in which all property is held collectively and authorities control the distribution of property and resources. For a time in the twentieth century, communist societies in the Soviet Union, China, Eastern Europe, and East and Southeast Asia included almost half of the world’s population.
Competitive Market	A system of exchange of goods and services based on supply and demand.
Democracy	A system of government based upon majority decisions made by voting citizens.
Death Camp	Camps set up by Nazi Germany during World War II with the primary purpose of exterminating Jews, Roma people, communists, homosexuals, disabled people, and others. Note that death camps are not the same as concentration camps.
Economics	The study of the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services.
Energy	The capacity to do work, associated with matter and radiation. Includes kinetic energy, potential energy, and chemical energy, among others.
Exchange Networks	Networks that link people, societies, and regions through the transfer of information, goods, people, and sometimes disease. All forms of collective learning work through exchange networks.
Fossil Fuel	A carbon- based material such as coal, oil, or natural gas that can be used as an energy source. Fossil fuels were originally formed when the remains of living organisms were buried and broken down by intense heat and pressure over millions of years.
Globalisation	The expansion of exchange networks until they begin to reach across the entire world.
Gross Domestic Product (GDP)	The total value of all goods produced by a country.
Imperialism	The aggressive effort by one group or nation to dominate another group or nation.
Industrialisation	The transition to mechanized or more technologically advanced production methods, such as factories.
Industrial Revolution	A period of technological innovation starting in England late in the eighteenth century that resulted in a major change in the way goods were produced, and caused a major shift in global economics. These innovations came as a result of the systematic use of fossil fuels in place of human and animal power to manufacturing, communications, and transportation.
Innovation	Generation of a new idea, method, or product.
Marxism	Ideologies inspired by the writings of Karl Marx (1818–1883). Marx argued that capitalism was the key feature of the modern world, but that capitalism created such profound inequality that it would eventually have to be abolished in a future socialist society.
Militarism	The philosophy that a strong military must be maintained and ready for use at any time in defense of a nation’s sovereignty.
Modern Revolution	A deliberately vague label for the revolutionary transformations that have created the modern world. The Modern Revolution began around 1500 and ushered in the modern era of human history.
Monopoly	A situation in which there is only one supplier of a commodity. According to economic theory, monopolies stifle innovation because monopolists have a captive market so they do not need to worry about improving the quality or reducing the price of their products.
Nationalism	The idea that citizens of a country are part of something bigger than themselves and that they are loyal to a set of national ideals and practices.
Periodisation	An approach to history in which time is divided into distinct and identifiable periods (for example, the Jurassic or Paleolithic).
Populism	An approach to government that favors ordinary citizens as opposed to traditional ruling parties.
Propaganda	Information, widely distributed to further the purposes of a particular cause or idea.
Reparations	In the aftermath of war, money given by the defeated country to the victors to compensate for war-time damage.
Steam Engines	Machines that burn coal to produce steam, used to perform mechanical work. James Watt configured the first profitable one at the time of the American Revolution. Their use launched human society over a threshold no longer limited by the annual flow of solar energy.
Transportation	The technologies and methods by which people and goods are moved from place to place. Methods of transportation include porters, horse-drawn wagons, cars, trains, boats, planes, and shipping containers, among many others.