This course examines several topics which have created controversy in linguistics, topics about which various scholars have expressed opposing views through published articles. By reading and discussing these debates, students will learn how to critically analyze linguistics articles. The aim of this course is for students to develop skills in identifying the authors' assumptions, assessing their argumentation and recognizing how linguists build arguments for opposing views on a certain issue. 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 ability to write academically, and more particularly in linguistics. The title of the course might sound scary, but the course itself is not at all! Formerly LIN481H5.