Mongols on Trial

We are going to put the Mongols on trial for crimes against humanity over the next week. Half of you will serve as the Prosecution, and the other half will serve as the Defense.  The Mongols are charged with Genocide, Terrorism and Kidnapping, and we must agree what these terms mean before the trial begins.  You will choose a role and have to play that part in the trial--the roles range from actual Mongol leaders, to alleged victims of the crimes, to lawyers on each side.

You scanned the documents in class today, but just in case your app is wonky, the link to the trial overview is here, and the link to the trial process is here. You can follow the trial on Twitter with the hashtag #mongoltrial. We will live tweet the trial and blog about the process as well!

This will be slightly different than what we've done before, in that you are all going to need to read Chapter 18 over the next week, as it contains information that is relevant to all facets of the trial.  However, I will not be breaking the chapter down into chunks for you; you will do that on your own based on what you need to read for your role.  HOWEVER, EVERYONE IS RESPONSIBLE FOR READING THE WHOLE CHAPTER!

The trial itself will begin on Monday the 17th and continue through the 18th. In between now and then I will present some materials that will help you go beyond the textbook. So there will be some in class work time for you to do research, prepare questions and figure out your characters.

For those of you planning ahead, we will have a test on Thursday the 20th. It will cover chapters 13, 14, 15, 16, and 18. It will be in the usual format: 70 multiple choice questions.

You will note that we are taking things slightly out of order in the book--we skip Chapter 17.  Don't worry, though, you will still get to read it, just not before vacation starts!