RED DEAD'S HISTORY

An intriguing look at how the gaming age offers imaginative possibilities for the teaching of history.

Video games have come a long way, writes Olsson, since he spent many hours of his younger life perched in front of a screen. In the Covid-19 lockdown period, he rediscovered gaming and was amazed at the degree of development and sophistication of recent decades, something highlighted by the popular Red Dead series. As a professor of history at the University of Tennessee specializing in the post–Civil War era, he came up with the idea of creating a course connected to the game, using it as a platform to explore the social and political tensions in the U.S. in the late 19th century, when the game is set. The author shows how the series, especially Red Dead Redemption II, contains a huge amount of historical information. The games are certainly violent, but it was a violent time, as society struggled to come to terms with rapid industrialization, emerging corporate capitalism, and entrenched racial conflict. The series follows a group of (fairly) honorable outlaws as they travel from the Midwest, through the South, and into the Appalachians. The Red Dead designers obviously devoted great attention to the detailed artwork and narrative development, although a problem is that many of the issues raised in the game relate more to the 1870s than the 1890s. Olsson suggests that the next installment in the series should be set in the years immediately after the Civil War. “When we balance the ledger book of good and bad, the game ultimately does far more to advance historical understanding than not,” he writes. This book is not for everyone, but it is informative and enjoyable.

Olsson has much to say about connecting the past to the present in ways that are novel and fun.