Rock, Paper, Saints and Sinners
Might the first Native American Catholic saint have been influenced in her faith by a board game? New Generation Thinker Gemma Tidman explores the power games of C17 missionaries.
A 1660s board game made by a Jesuit missionary sent to the Mohawk Valley in North America is the subject of New Generation Thinker Gemma Tidman's essay. This race game, a little like Snakes and Ladders, depicts the path of a Christian life and afterlife. Gemma explores what the game tells us about how powerful people have long turned to play, images, and other persuasive means to secure converts and colonial subjects.
Dr Gemma Tidman is a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow at Queen Mary University London and a New Generation Thinker on the scheme run by the 大象传媒 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to put research on radio. You can hear more from her in Free Thinking discussions about Game-playing, and Sneezing, smells and noses.
Producer: Torquil MacLeod
Last on
Broadcast
- Wed 27 Mar 2024 22:45大象传媒 Radio 3
Death in Trieste
A 1760s murder still informs ideas about aesthetics, a certain sort of sex, and death.
Watch: My Deaf World
Five compelling experiences of what it is like to be deaf in 21st-century Britain.
The Book that Changed Me
Five figures from the arts and science introduce books that changed their lives and work.
Download The Essay
Download all the episodes from the series and listen at your leisure.
Podcast
-
![]()
The Essay
Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond.
