This course examines topics which have created controversy in linguistics, topics about which scholars have expressed opposing views through published articles. By reading and discussing these debates, students will galvanize their knowledge base in linguistics and develop skills in identifying the authors' assumptions, assessing their argumentation and recognizing how linguists build arguments to present an opposing view. The topics may range from big picture questions like the validity of Universal Grammar to more specific questions about a linguistic phenomenon. By the end of the course, students will have developed more acute reading skills, thereby also improving their academic writing skills. The title of the course might sound scary, but the course itself is not at all!