Back in Atlanta for another event that centers around talking at and to other people about complicated ideas. One month ago I was just here teaching and learning at the USU Debate Championships hosted by Morehouse College. Now I have just finished attending the Rhetoric Society of America bi-annual conference. Long story short: It was…

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At the USU national tournament held two weeks ago in Atlanta, BP debaters found themselves confronted with two motions that I believe were the first moments where debaters could have turned debate on itself as a topic. This is something that regularly and easily happens in contemporary policy debate. It cannot yet happen, and may…

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No shortage of thoughts about USU floating around the internet. For me, it was one of the best tournaments I’ve been to in a long while. No I’m not some weirdo – I too was bothered by the delays, the cut round, the wording of that motion. Even in spite of all these things it was…

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Debate Stream on YouTube is streaming CEDA Nationals live. CEDA, anachronistically stands for Cross Examination Debate Association, but the debate style is that of American policy debate with all the speed, crazy citations, and wild combination of post-structuralist theory with contemporary political discourse you could want. It’s shaping up to be a good weekend. What…

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This is a recording of my lecture on teaching debate and argument. I was asked to give it at the start of the 2016 Budapest Open, and was happy to do so. Looking back on it now, I probably should have presented something a bit more animated. I was getting pretty sick at the time…

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Re-read this essay of mine recently after someone remarked how good it was. I wasn’t sure, but after re-reading it I think they are right – it might need a bit more attention than it gets in its original published form. It’s funny how an old piece can come back to life for you after…

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“Competitors and Adjudicators are encouraged to look up information before, during, and after the debate via the free WiFi and the academic databases provided by our sponsor, ProQuest.” “In lieu of the social we will have a round table featuring editors from the Economist, The BBC, Reuters, and The New York Times. There will be…

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“How do you get students interested in policy debate?”     I run into an alum of my debate program on the street outside the campus, around 11 o’clock at night. The timing couldn’t be worse (or perfect) —  I’ve just finished teaching my three hour class on debate where the oldest and most technical American…

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Screening the 2005 documentary Resolved today in preparation for showing it, as I always do, in my debate course. It’s a great text for discussing the nature of policy debate and how it functions within an educational institution and what it does or fails to do for/to students. In thinking about debate as shattering and re-constituting…

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I am very surprised that I am able to teach a debate class this semester. Where I work, a class won’t make unless you have over 10 people enrolled in it. It seems like a reasonable rule, but my university also has a bloated core of courses without much substitution allowed (9 hours of philosophy…

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