Progress?

Our new unit in American Studies is (surprisingly) again extremely relavent to the current issues of our world. The word progress has been thrown around a lot in the past week or two. Our first African-American president is progress we are all very proud of as americans. In class, our discussion about progress was at first very centered around technology, something that has drastically changed since our parents' time. But I think progress can go a little deeper than just what gadgets we can now fit in our pockets. Societal progress is something that I believe is much more important in a historical sense. Not only does it reveal the change society has gone through by what has become commonplace, but this kind of progress is easily documented by benchmarks we as a community have reached. For example, our first black president being elected is a very striking and emotional event that will definately be remembered for centuries. But any barriers (race/gender) being broken in things like sports or politics are direct benchmarks that truly reflect the progress of a society.