- Professor Tore Olsson, author of 'Red Dead History,' will be conducting GTA history classes at the University of Tennessee.
- The classes are set to begin on January 20, 2026.
- He originally planned to include GTA 6 as part of his curriculum, but the game's delay ended those plans.
The long wait until GTA 6’s release drags on, with rumors of further delays constantly looming in the background. This uncertainty, coupled with the baffling period of time between GTA V and GTA 6’s supposed release, has birthed the phrase “We got (insert pop culture event/long-awaited product/ironic anecdote here) before GTA 6.” The sheer range of things that can be inserted into that blank gets more audacious every day, and the latest one happens to be a GTA history class at an actual educational institution.
That’s right, we got a GTA history class before GTA 6. There, I said it. Set to commence on January 20, 2026, at the University of Tennessee, the world’s first GTA history class will be taught by Professor Tore Olsson. The course, titled “Grand Theft America: U.S. History Since 1980 through the GTA Video Games,” recontextualizes real American history by viewing it through GTA-tinted lenses. By using the franchise’s narrative framework and satirical themes as a periscope, the class will examine what’s actually taken place in the United States over the last half-century.
This isn’t Olsson’s first gaming retrospective either, as he famously penned an audiobook on Rockstar’s other marquee franchise, Red Dead Redemption. That one’s titled ‘Red Dead History,’ and is narrated by Arthur Morgan himself, Roger Clark. It attracted plenty of media attention at the time, and now Professor Olsson is taking a stab at recounting the madcap franchise that is Grand Theft Auto.
In an interview with IGN, he confessed that his curriculum planned on including GTA 6 as well, but we all know what happened. “I had originally hoped that it would be a major part! (GTA 6),” he stated.
“I first began planning this class more than a year ago, when GTA 6 was scheduled for release in late Fall of 2025 – well-timed for the start of our semester in January 2026. Of course, the recent delay to May 2026 made that impossible. So yes, that’s why we got a GTA college history class before we got GTA 6! (I really hope 6’s release date doesn’t fall during Spring final exams week, because I’d be very worried about my students’ ability to concentrate…) I certainly plan to integrate the new game into future versions of the course, but for now I’ll have to rely on the older games. Thankfully, that’s a ton of material.”
When quizzed on why he designed his class around GTA, Olsson had this to say, Few developers rival Rockstar in terms of the granular detail that goes into their games. But I also think Rockstar is rather rare in their eagerness to comment on the social fabric of American life. Their games – from L.A. Noire through Red Dead through GTA – are all interested in saying something about the unique strangeness of the American experiment. What they say is sometimes thoughtful, sometimes not – but that they’re trying is fascinating.“
If you’re interested in the classes, Olsson teased an audiobook version along the lines of “Grand Theft America” in the future. But he didn’t reveal a concrete release window.
