New Century, New America?
This game takes students to the beginning of the modern era when urbanization, industrialization, and massive waves of immigration were transforming the U.S. way of life. As the game begins, suffragists are taking to the streets demanding a constitutional amendment for the vote. What, they ask, is women’s place in society? Are they to remain in the home or take an active role in the government of their communities and their nation? Labor has turned to the strike to demand living wages and better conditions; some are even proposing an industrial democracy where workers take charge of industries. Can corporate capitalism allow an economically just society or must it be overturned? African-Americans, suffering from the worst working conditions, disenfranchisement, and social segregation, debate how to support their community through education and protest, thereby challenging their continuing marginalization in both the South and the North. Members of all these groups converge in Greenwich Village to debate their views with the artists and bohemians who are in the process of remaking themselves into the new men and new women of the twentieth century. The game asks what social changes are most important as well as how one can or should realize these goals.
Using the Game
Reacting Consortium members can access all downloadable materials (including expanded and updated materials) below. You will be asked to sign in before downloading. Basic game materials (Gamebook, Role Sheets, Instructor's Guide, and Handouts) are available to any instructor through the publisher.
Role Sheets and Add'l Materials
Students also need a Role Sheet, which contains biographical information, role-specific resources or assignments, and their character's secret victory objectives.
.zip file of .pdf files.
.zip file of .pdf and .docx files.
Resources for Introduction and/or Debrief
This includes digital Zoom backgrounds for your students.
Mary Jane Treacy
Mary Jane Treacy is professor emerita of modern languages and literatures at Simmons College, where she was also director of the honors program. She has been involved with the Reacting to the Past pedagogy since 2005, when she played a minor spy in the court of Henry VIII and then set out to write Greenwich Village, 1913, for her course in the roots of feminism. She has taught Greenwich Village in both women’s and gender studies courses and first-year seminars. She is also author of a new Flashpoints game on a labor strike in Paterson, NJ, and a game on the aftermath of political violence in Argentina. A member of the Editorial Board, she has the privilege of reading and play-testing new games that take her to all eras and parts of the world.