Throughout his Republic, Plato explored a series of crucial political concepts through the literary form of the dialogue. For this assessment, you will select one key term from Platos Republic and compose a dialogue between two speakers that explores the concepts various possible meanings. You may choose from the following list of terms: Virtue Justice Faction Luxury The City The first speaker must be a character from the text, and their interpretation of the key term must reflect (but not reproduce verbatim) the interpretation that Plato gave to that character in the original text. In other words, you will use this first character to demonstrate how well you understand a philosophical argument from the text itself. The second speaker will be a character of your choosing (real, fictional, or invented entirely). You will use this figure to argue against the character that you select from Platos Republic and provide your own interpretation of the key term. You do not necessarily need to disagree with your interlocutors argument, so long as you can convincingly play the devils advocate, but it may simplify your task to select a character and argument from the Republic with which you actively disagree. You will submit a brief outline to me on November 1 via Google Classroom that indicates your chosen term, your two characters, the basic arguments that each will make, and a preliminary sketch of their conversation. This outline will be worth 5% of your semester grade. You will submit the final dialogue to me via Google Classroom on November 8. It will be worth 20% of your semester grade. 2 I will assign grades based on the following metrics: How well you demonstrate understanding of the philosophical argument Plato assigned to your first character. I do not want you to quote directly from or simply change the word order of the original text. You must paraphrase the argument and make it your own, so to speak. How effectively you argue against your first characters position. Though you can choose for it to do so, your second characters argument does not have to reflect any of the philosophical positions that Plato offered in his Republic. But it must be logical and thoughtful. How much care you devote to recreating the literary form of the dialogue itself. Your second character should question, challenge, and guide the conversation in a way that is similar to Platos Socrates. How much care and commitment you devote to your writing. Is your assignment well- composed and free from grammatical and spelling errors?
