How To Read Academic Texts Without Drowning
Nobody teaches you how to read in college. They just assign more of it.
Academic texts are written in a language that assumes fluency you were never given. The result: students spend hours with a reading, retain almost nothing, and can't connect it to anything else they've read.
This seminar breaks the code.
Led by Karmen Michael Smith — published author across theology, culture, and systems thinking — who has spent years teaching scholars how to extract what matters and build with it.
You will leave with:
A system for reading for argument, not just content
The ability to identify claims, stakes, and tensions in dense academic prose
A note-taking architecture that actually supports synthesis later
Practical tools for finding the conversation between sources
Who this is for: Anyone assigned academic reading who has ever finished a chapter and had no idea what they just read — undergrad through doctoral level.
Format: ~90 minutes via Zoom · Live instruction + demonstration · Q&A