Update: Democratic Labor in Athens and America

By Colleen Cable

Sitting around a table talking about Plato and The Republic, student Abraham Apfel never felt more like the stereotypical college student. “We didn’t have any iced mochas though,” said Apfel. “We didn’t have berets either,” replied Professor Brett Rogers. Although discussing Plato may seem like the pinnacle of the classic college experience, the class Democratic Labors in Athens and America is not the usual college class because it combines role-playing games and history.

The class just finished playing their first game, which was a simulation of 403 BCE Athens. The way the game is set up is that there are two factions of generally opposing characters, as well as six Indeterminates who are characters with specific or specialized agendas. The main goal of the game is to pass legislation that fulfills the characters’ goals. In order to get the highest score possible within the game, plotting, politics, and alliances are methods often used by the players. “By the fifth session everyone’s a mastermind,” said Rogers, the professor who brought this historical role-playing class to Gettysburg.

Even though the students in the class “were unsure how the game was supposed to run,” said student Ryan Tunkel, “most people were willing to dive right in.” The gung-ho attitude of the class materialized with a student storming the podium in rage, a coup, and an attempt to strip someone of their right to vote.

There was even a student who stayed so well in character that Tunkel “spent until a couple of days ago thinking he was playing the game making very poor decisions and putting a lot of people off until I realized he had been in character the entire time,” he said.

While staying in character is an important aspect of the game, “the person’s personality definitely comes out in their role,” said Apfel. Even though the player does have control over which actions they will take, Tunkel said, as a democrat, his “votes are often pre-scripted and to deviate from them would cause me to lose the game and act out of character.”

Another aspect of character is wardrobe. “We all had some very nice dresses on,” said Apfel, referencing the period dress that most students wore to class. “One person that is playing a war hero has come in every day with a sling and battle wounds created from make up,” said Tunkel.

Political strategy also proved to be a very central aspect to the game. One student brought cupcakes into class in order to bribe the other players. The near necessity of making alliances with other students causes the students in the class to know one another better. “Enough wheeling and dealing is necessary in the game that you need to know everyone and there was a lot of meeting outside of class,” said Tunkel. Apfel agrees that the very nature of the class causes everyone to get to know one another better.

Although the format and concept of the class are outlined in the “Reacting to the Past” series, Rogers incorporated many adjustments for his class. For example, he didn’t want his students to come away with the idea that there were cookie-cutter characters, or to categorize them like “we’re the red team, we’re the blue team,” said Rogers. People don’t always so cleanly fall into factions, he said, “it’s supposed to be messier.” Especially with this class, more people were pursuing individual legislation, as opposed to just dealing with the main issues, said Rogers.

This game also pushes both the students and the teacher to expand their knowledge of the time period. One student in the class “knows a shocking amount about Athenian real estate,” said Rogers. Also because of the active online community for classes like these, there is a sharing of knowledge about subjects scholars had never thought about before.

Because this class is unique in structure, there is difficulty for the teacher in planning out the course of the game. “You need a very active teacher to do this well,” said Apfel. There is a bigger sacrifice of time on the teacher’s part because they will need to spend more time talking to students or emailing with them. As a teacher, “you tend to overplan things, so it’s a really risky thing because you don’t know how the day’s going to go,” said Rogers.