Students in Ahbel-Rappe’s course, CLCIV 47: Pagans and Christians in the Ancient World, create podcasts featuring a conversation between two culturally divided characters from the same historical era. The pairs include Christians and polytheists from fourth-century Rome who occupy different positions toward Christianity.
The project begins with a role-playing exercise in which students are invited to a Halloween party as Pagan-Christian pairs. They research their personas, then, at the party, meet other pairs and reveal aspects of themselves. They use that experience at the party to help develop a way of talking to one another, ultimately creating a script for a podcast.
What makes this exercise innovative is having students embody ancient figures while discovering how to coexist despite cultural conflict. Students explore how to negotiate contemporary cultural divisions using history, acting, honesty and radical imagination to face off against the “other.” This also teaches upper-level writing across disciplines by getting students to revise their conversations, incorporate rhetoric and persuasion, and reflect on what they learned.
Above photo:
Sara Ahbel-Rappe, Professor of Greek and Latin, LSA
