Author: Steve

  • Podium Web Series on Rhetoric and Debate

    On campus early today to participate in filming a new web series about public speaking, debate, and political discourse. I am even wearing a jacket, which lets you know how important today is. The series is called Podium, and it’s produced by Radical Media. They are creating a new and contemporary series about political speech.…

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  • Fear the Sophist

    We were turned down for a grant. I sat in a room with my colleagues and University representatives as we stared at a phone. On the other end a woman from the U.S. State Department read us the reasons we were declined. A panel of experts from different areas evaluated our proposal – to offer…

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  • Montana bound

    I no longer prep like I used to. Perhaps it is a sign of maturing as a teacher. Perhaps it is a sign of becoming comfortable with the role. More darkly – perhaps it is a sign of being over it, of losing feeling for it. I’m thousands of feet in the air above the…

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  • The Order of Eastern Things

    English: Three Chinese philosophers. Lao Tzu, Wen Wang, and Confucius. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) Teaching The Order of Things this semester has been quite good for my own thinking process, but boy was I wrong about this book when I first read it in undergraduate. It’s hard for me to accept sometimes that I am no longer just…

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  • Why is Policy Debate so Hard?

    The summer break for blogging is over! There really shouldn’t have been much of a break – but the world decided I should take one. The world being really, really poor internet due to our hotel in Mexico (not Mexico, which was really great, and had some wonderful free public wi-fi that was superior to…

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  • Connected

    Yuzen, a buddhist monk from the Sōtō Zen sect begging at Oigawa, Kyoto. Begging is part of the training of some Buddhist sects. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) It’s one thing to go around spouting off Buddhist quotes because they sound good, or because they are apt to the situation/audience (like a good Sophist does, so I…

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  • 2012: Summer of Debating

    I did not plan, and usually don’t plan to have debate in my summers, but this summer has been an exception.  Opportunities to do some off the path teaching for me have been too hard to turn down. I’ve recently returned from my first event with the International Debate Education Association (IDEA) in Leon, Mexico…

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  • Karl Popper Debate Championship 2012

    English: Karl Popper in the 1980’s. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) Today is the first day of the Karl Popper Debating Championships at the +International Debate Education Association (IDEA) Youth Forum in Leon, Mexico. Depending on the state of the internet at the University we are hosting these debates, I will give some updates here and there about what’s going…

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  • Infrequently Asked Questions

    Circle-no-questions (Photo credit: Wikipedia) Why do I feel that coming to an event like this, ostensibly only about debating, do I find more people interested in my research and interested in my writing than I found among the professors in my field that I studied with in graduate school? Why is it that “the choice”…

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  • 99 Problems, and keep them coming

    Day one of the IDEA Youth Forum instructor training is over, and one thing stands out: There is no shortage of problems that you can come up with when you are talking about teaching debate. Perhaps problem is the wrong word. Maybe challenge? But that sounds too much like business/boardroom speak. I like the idea…

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