This exploration of world history takes an interdisciplinary, global (rather than a regional or national) approach - tracing those major forces, movements, and events that had a world-wide impact. Surveying a full sweep of world history, the seventh edition provides a balanced coverage of both Eastern and Western regions, from earliest man to 1500 AD. In particular this new edition connects the past, present and future and the combination of resulting patterns, drawing implications for the future should those patterns emerge once again.