✍️ Scholars Guild Circle
HOW TO JOIN 🤔
You'll need to apply to this guild as we have limited slots
WHAT 🔭
The Scholar's Guild conducts research that will help to understand, articulate, and implement a new vision of what it means to flourish in the 21st Century. At the end of 8-weeks we will publish our research via any format you wish (essay, poetry, photography, etc.) into an online and physical journal that will be shared publicly as an artifact for this guild.
Inspired by Berkman Klein Center’s research sprints, this guild will focus on conducting research through 3 lenses that focus on flourishing at every level: as an individual, in community, and within broader cultural political and economic systems.
Each person will write/create a piece of work inquiring into one of these areas that will be refined and finished at the end of the quarter. We will support one another though social accountability, animated discussion, and peer editing.
WEEKLY SCHEDULE 🗓️
Week 1: Intros, Form Research Groups - Come up with 3-4 essay ideas per group
⭐ milestone: you have a clear sense of which level you're interested in and topic you want to pursue.
🔭 Research
Week 2: Brainstorm journal article ideas. What questions are you exploring?
⭐ milestone: clear set of research questions based off of initial research
Week 3: Research! - Collect articles and sources and take notes
⭐ milestone: deep in research
🪢 Synthesize
Week 4: Research and refine - Collect articles and sources and take notes
⭐ milestones: organize all research around final outline
✨ Refine
Week 5: Begin First Drafts - write up drafts of article
⭐ milestone: shitty first draft
Week 6: Revising - Edit 1
Week 7: Revising - Edit 2
⭐ milestone: finish draft
Week 8: Finish and present in symposium!
Week 10-12ish: launch party for journal - Celebrate and share The Commons + friends of the Commons
WHO SHOULD JOIN 👪
Scholars :) who want to support one another in research, writing, and publishing
COMMITMENT LEVEL ♥️
If you join this guild you'll be committing to coming to at least 80% of sessions
You'll also be committing to producing one piece of the work at the end of 8 weeks
RESEARCH GROUPS 🔬
Click here for a fuller description of the research groups and potential research questions.
A note on research groups: We have distinguished separate research groups which focus on theories of flourishing at different levels: the individual, communal, and socio-political. These are not separate processes, but rather one coherent, nested system in which each level feeds into and out of each other. Each group will be zooming in on one level, taking that point of view, but we will also focus on how they all feed into and build off of each other.
Inner Work
💡 The root of flourishing is an inner alignment with your values. This starts with becoming aware of your emotions as a compass that can direct you towards what makes you come alive. This research group aims to explore theories of healing, how inner work can transform your experience in the world, and how it serves as the foundation that a healthy flourishing society is built on.
Culture and Community: Sense-making
💡 Once you have developed inner awareness and begun to discover what feels aligned, and makes you come alive, the next step is to think about how to best bring that into the world. This requires institutions built for collective meaning-making, as people come together to live, work, and play in community and make sense of the world together. This research group will explore what makes for flourishing communities and healthy cultures, that facilitate the process of inner development and allow for people to come into their fullest self-expression in community.
Political, Social, and Economic Systems
💡 Flourishing individuals and communities are embedded within larger political, social and economic contexts that affect how we are able to cohere together. We need to rebuild outlets for expression on a larger scale, rethinking education, governance, cities, and the labor market to provide for lasting flourishing. This research group will explore theories and policies of flourishing on a macro level from the lens of economics, philosophy, sociology, urban planning and legal/political theory.