"I decided to use one of the immersive, historical role playing games from the "Reacting to the Past" series to explore the impacts of invention and technology on society." - Megan Conklin

Background

I have been teaching an upper-level, interdisciplinary seminar course on "technology and society" topics for several years. Some of the Big Questions that I like to explore in a class like this are: Is technological progress always a good thing? What are the human impacts of technology? What are the newest, most innovative technologies being developed right now, and how will they impact our lives?

However, it is sometimes difficult for students to see that even the most future-looking topics in technology have important historical contexts. For example, students studying the ethics of 21st century genetic engineering should learn about 19th and 20th century eugenics movements. Students studying technology as a utopia should read Plato. Students struggling with the place of science in religious life should read what Galileo wrote on this topic.

In Fall 2006 I became interested in whether we can take the critical moments in history and allow those to direct a seminar course that is fundamentally about the future of technology. After experimenting some with designing my own role playing games, I decided to use an immersive, historical role playing game from the Reacting to the Past series to explore this idea.