Читать книгу The Craft of Innovative Theology. Argument and Process онлайн

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There are two ways that this book can be used. First, a professor can start at the beginning and treat the book as a textbook for “creative theology.” Second, a professor can move around the book focusing on those chapters that are easier for a beginner to access first and moving on to those chapters that are more advanced. This works for a “research methods” course. Now there are many “research methods” books on the market, but none do the work of providing research method techniques for the student who is going to start writing at the level of a Ph.D. or a research Master’s Degree. This text teaches research writing at the highest academic level. If used for a research methods course, then the result is that the student at the end of the course will have a real sense of the different types of research levels and different types of research writing.

We deliberately wanted a book that embraced a full spectrum of research writing, from the very accessible to the very difficult. To give the reader a sense of the level, each chapter has a ranking. Level 1 means that the article is accessible and teaches basic research skills. Level 2 means that the article has certain concepts that will require explanation, but a good student can grasp the issues. Level 3 means that the article assumes some knowledge of the field and, without such literacy, the argument will be difficult to grasp. One assumption we are making here is that reading articles that are technically beyond the reader actually helps the reader to grow. With the help of the glossary (all words in bold in the text are explained in the glossary at the end of the book) and with the sheer discipline of reading to the end, the reader will learn how to read at such a technical level. Level 4 means that there is a level of technical understanding and background knowledge that is essential for understanding the article. In the end, research articles are an act of participation in a pre‐existing conversation. To have credibility, one must know the existing participants in the conversation. The essays included in this book exhibit this kind of credibility and exemplify the ultimate goal of great innovative academic writing.