Contact Information
Email: arosenth@gustavus.edu
Phone: 933-7437
Office: Old Main 204H
Office Hours: Monday and Wednesday 10-11:30am and by appointment
Course Description
Most college seminars adopt, intentionally or not, a Socratic approach: the instructor guides students through difficult texts by posing questions. This class is different. Here students will play two elaborate games, one set in Athens in 403 B.C. and centered on Plato's Republic and one set in revolutionary France and centered on the writings of Jean Jacques Rousseau and Edmund Burke.
For the first few sessions of each game, I will provide guidance on the texts, issues, and historical context on which the game will turn. During the second or third session, I will distribute role assignments, based on historical figures.
Early in the third session (or thereabouts), the class will break into factions, as students with similar roles meet together to accomplish their objectives. You will probably meet with your faction outside of class as well.
By the fourth or fifth session, the class will again meet as one. Students whose characters function in a supervisory capacity (president of the Athenian Assembly or of the French National Assembly) will preside over what transpires. I will intrude merely to resolve disputes or issue rulings on other matters.
The heart of each game is persuasion. For nearly every role to which you've been assigned, you must persuade others that "your" views make more sense than those of your opponents. Your views will be informed by important texts cited in your game objectives.