Graduate Studies course on D&D?

[Dark Jezter]

This reminds me of another game-related college course I heard about. Apparantly, in the early 1980s, some Ivy League university (I think it may have been Harvard) offered a course on how to master the Rubik's Cube. No, I'm not making this up.

 

[nakia]

One of my scholarly/professional interests in the intersection of popular culture and philosophic ideas -- I'm a professor of philosophy and history of education. I use these intersections all the time in my classes as a way to 1. Introduce certain concepts and 2. Get my students to think critically about media and culture. I use film a lot. I've shown High Noon and talked about the conflict between duty and utilitarianism. I've shown The Matrix and talked about skepticism and epistemology.

I've never found a way to work D&D into my classes yet, but I am working on incorporating some RPG elements into my Foundations of Education class. The students will take on important educational roles in a community (teachers, school board members, parents) and create a school or district. I'll be the "DM" and describe what happens based on their choices:
"You school's enrollment is 20% larger than expected. What do you do?"

In general, I am all in favor of a D&D course. It sounds like an interesting case study for business students and could be very cross-disciplinary.

 

[arscott]

Hmmm, is anyone else here familiar with the jokes about certain universities offering courses in basketweaving...?

But basketweaving and the like aren't generally graduate level courses, as this seems to be.

 

[adwyn]

I had a college course called "Sub Grade D&D", but it was demolitions and detonations in a hard rock mining eviroment. Fun yes, but I still would have liked a more gaming appropriate course.

 

[NiTessine]

Heh. Recently, one Markus Montola was accepted to write his doctoral dissertation about roleplaying games in the Tampere University, Finland. Here's his initial research plan.

 

[the black knight]

How the professor managed to get this on the class schedule is beyond me. If this is where American education is headed, we're going down the tubes faster than I thought. D&D is just a game, people, stop trying/wishing to make it something other than that.

 

[the_myth]

How the professor managed to get this on the class schedule is beyond me. If this is where American education is headed, we're going down the tubes faster than I thought. D&D is just a game, people, stop trying/wishing to make it something other than that.

and Shakespeare's plays were just drivel for the lower classes. Oh, and the aristocrats and their whores.

I am intrigued at how the professor managed to fit this topic into that department, but just about any facet of culture (including stuff offhandedly passed over as "just a game") is worthy of study.

...at least to a sociologist, anthropologist, historian, literature scholar....you know, those people who study art, culture and all that frivilous stuff that is SOOOOOOOOO unimportant compared to science and technology...or business.

yeah, if it's not practical, it's junk.

And most of that stuff called junk (also often called "entertainment") is utilized by just about every person on the planet.

Might not it be important for someone to think about it then?

 

[VirgilCaine]

Although I never took classes like these, I found that the classes that sounded like they were fun and would be "fluff" classes often ended up being among the most difficult due to the in-depth nature of the course. It's not like they are sitting around watching Trek episodes, they are probably looking at the cultural experiences that brought about the issues in the episodes, comparing them to historical events of the time, and looking at the social phenomenon that lead to the shows, and what lead to the longevity of the shows long after they ended. All valid topics for sociology or history classes.

History major.

Giggity giggity.

I've shown High Noon and talked about the conflict between duty and utilitarianism.

Doesn't this problem come up in D&D everytime the Paladin accepts a prisoner's surrender? Or tries to reform an evil humanoid?
"Yeah, we probably should put some long-term effort into stopping these attacks and making some kind of peace with these creatures, but it's easier to just kill them."

I had a college course called "Sub Grade D&D", but it was demolitions and detonations in a hard rock mining eviroment. Fun yes, but I still would have liked a more gaming appropriate course.

Gaming appropriate? Dwarves? Hello? McFly?

 

[Tyler Do'Urden]

How the professor managed to get this on the class schedule is beyond me. If this is where American education is headed, we're going down the tubes faster than I thought. D&D is just a game, people, stop trying/wishing to make it something other than that.

Baseball, Chess, and Sumo Wrestling are all games too... what's your point?

D&D, as the first RPG and the harbinger of a massive social phenomenon- the forerunner of MUDS, MMORPGs, and perhaps Virtual Reality- is definitely worthy of a class. In a world in which average young Asian professionals are willing to spend the lion's share of their paycheck on real estate with no existence in material reality; where some people consider their real life to be that of an online persona; where someday soon full-immersion virtual reality could become many people's second, if not first, home-

Yeah, I'd say studying D&D is relevant to an MBA program, especially one focused on training professionals for the e-Commerce, Communications, Entertainment, Publishing, or Software industries...

 

[mhacdebhandia]

How the professor managed to get this on the class schedule is beyond me. If this is where American education is headed, we're going down the tubes faster than I thought. D&D is just a game, people, stop trying/wishing to make it something other than that.

I'd rather see scholarly investigation of D&D than the business school crap they try to pass of as a university degree these days.