Life, The Universe and Everything

Tag: International Relations

  • Theory=Model=Game

    Neil Ferguson‘s mis-adventures in gaming are highlighted on Richard Mehlinger’s blog on HASTAC in a a post which reinforces the dangers of non-gamers getting swept up by the gee-whiz of digital games. I’ve always been wary of digital games for teaching, which is why I’ve always used old fashion non-digital game play and design in my history…

  • Gaming Reality History

    Teaching contemporary International Relations with in-class simulations is sometimes challenging when the simulation scenario may be radically changed by what is happening in the real world, but that is the challenge my HI3112 International Organisations students are dealing with this week in this terms conference game on the Horn Of Africa/Arab Spring. “Upstairs” literally as well as figuratively, the MA class are dealing with the problems of designing a…

  • Twitter, the July Days and the Arab Spring

    Crowds in revolutions are fascinating for the historian as we try to unpick and explain to our students how the “Paris Mob” operated so the tweets from the revolutions of the “Arab Spring” are not only a wonderful document of a struggle for democracy, but also a case study in revolution.

  • Reworking Courses 2011

    The best time to plan next years courses is right after this year’s end and I am already sketching out some revisions to my options for the coming year. Some old assessments are going, some new stuff is in and one course is going in reverse.

  • Another Semester, Another Simulation

    My International Organisations course, which is heavily simulation based, has reached the end of another run, and the end of course discussion, I shared a few thoughts on it with my students, and some of their ideas are flowing back from that.While my reflections are fresh (and for the benefit of the snowbound who missed…

  • Global Responsibilty to Protect – at a cost

    I found a new, important journal in international affairs  called Global Responsibility to Protect  which I an strongly recommend no one uses or cites because of it has chosen to buy into a dying model of academic publication. Read on and I’ll explain why I have problems with paying  $35 for an article.

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