Week 11 Discussion Guide: Thursday

        In class, we will revisit briefly the reasons why equally competent scholars in a discipline differ in their judgments, and how communities of interpretation or specialization help to manage those disputes.  Read these web pages on how to borrow evidence or reasoning from competent sources on the same topic,  how to recombine evidence or reasoning from competent sources on the same topic. and on how disciplines manage major disagreements about interpretation by creating communities of interpretation .  The first page might be called, colloquially, "how to pick a scholarly fight," and the second, "how to find a logical bridge between scholars who appear to be fighting."  The third page explains the peculiar strength disciplines acquire from managing such scholarly disagreements among "communities of interpretation."

        Then, I will ask each of you to explain your project to the class, and to describe what kinds of sources you have found, and what kinds of problems you have encountered.  We will try to solve some of those problems using our imaginations and online resources.  If we cannot solve the problems, at least we will try to develop strategies for how they could be solved after class.