Author: Steve
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A Podcast on the Relationship Between Music and Argument
I have a seperate blog for my podcast, In the Bin, but maybe I shouldn’t. I feel like my audience is the same for both, or at least people who read my writing here would also like my podcast. In this episode we talk to Dr. Ian Reyes about music and argument (he knows a…
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There are Topics Not Worth Debating. How Do We Know?
Got a great question along with a great article from a friend last month, now I’m finally getting to it. The simple response is, yes of course! But the more complex response is to examine how we should determine what debates are not worth having, and the criteria for this choice should be based not…
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Considering Two Films about Desire
Over the holidays I watched two films that were strongly suggested to me: The Rise of Skywalker and Wonder Woman 1984. I thought both were pretty good. I don’t usually have a lot to say about movies. I’m not really into them. It’s not my thing to sit and watch a movie. I’d much rather…
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A First Resolution for 2021, emphasis on “resolution.”
If I have one thing that I want to establish over the course of next year is the elimination of the phrase “public debate.” I used this term a lot without understanding the full implications of the insidious nature of this phrase. It’s used by those who are deeply involved in the world of tournament-contest…
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Holidays, Celebrate (Just One Day I Would Like)
Taking a (semi) break from posting through the new year, but will be posting when I feel like it over the winter break. There’s just too much to do and work on during this break from teaching, and I find myself running out of time to post here with my normal regularity. But in January…
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What is a Desirable Debating Culture?
Debate education, like debate in most democratic/capitalist countries, is set up poorly because it is set up in opposition to a way of thinking and judging. As any first year debate student can tell you, you can’t win a debate by setting up your position as “Don’t do what they want to do.” The debate…
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Finally a Big Snowstorm in Queens
I don’t put a lot of personal stuff on here, but thought I might start doing some different kinds of posts to keep up the variety. You can of course blow past these if you are here to read my thoughts on education, debate, and rhetoric. We had a big Noreaster -biggest one in a…
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Who Gets to Determine the Available Arguments on an Issue?
The ancient question of what topics are appropriate for students to speak about, debate about, or write about is evergreen. I think about this at the end and start of every teaching term. I see several approaches to this question that are well-warranted. It doesn’t mean that I agree with any of them though! The…
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Human Beings are No Longer Listening Carefully
One of the moments that sticks in my memory from graduate school is putting the SETI @ Home screen saver on a bunch of computers that weren’t mine. The small room at the end of the hallway in the speech communication (now Rhetorical Studies) department in Sims Hall at Syracuse University had a few old…
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The Reason that Debating is as Important to Education as Writing
“We are all teachers of writing,” is not only a good principle of education, or a good mantra of focus for teachers overwhelmed my the irrelevant minutae of state requirements and Common Core, but it is also a political statement – it’s the phrase of victory of rhetoric and composition, who conquered the educational world…
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