The assigned readings by Lou Burnard and Amanda Gailey were my first introduction to the Text Encoding Initiative. From the first article I learned about the impetus for establishing the TEI and the vision of one of its founders of its role in the development of humanities scholarship, and in the second I read one scholar’s account of the practical application of the TEI in her humanities projects. Because I have virtually no experience reading about software and encoding, I was happy to find that I was able to follow the  history and jargon of the TEI, and also understand the ideals and goals of the TEI’s role in the ongoing development of accessibility and communication between scholars and materials within the larger community of educators and students in the humanities.