Debate
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Debate is a formalized system of (usually) logical argument. It is a rule-governed contest with two or more sides, presided by a judge. Each side is attempting to win the approval of a designated audience, such as a judge.
Debate is a highly organized activity with sponsors such as the Oxford Union at the local, national, and international level.
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Debate in education
Many North American colleges and high schools field teams that participate in competitive debate. Parliamentary debating is also popular in other parts of the world, including Asia, Australia, New Zealand, and United Kingdom.
Parliamentary debate
"Parli" is conducted under rules derived from British parliamentary procedure. It features the competition of individuals in a multi-person setting. It borrows terms such as "government" and "opposition" from the British parliament. It is commonly used in Canada.
Parliamentary debating in Canada uses the following positions:
- Government
- Prime Minister (speaks first, and last 7 and 3 minutes respectively)
- Minister of the Crown (speaks third for 7 minutes)
- Opposition
- Minister of the Opposition (speaks second for 7 minutes)
- Leader of the Opposition (speaks fourth for 10 minutes)
Some tournaments allow points of information, where an opposing team member may stand up and ask a question to the member who is debating. Depending on the country, there are variations in speaking time, speaking order, and the number of speakers. For example, in New Zealand, both the leader of the Opposition and the Prime Minister offer a short summary as the last two speakers.
In the U.S., parliamentary debate is very popular in collegate competition, and has begun expanding on high school circuits. The National Parliamentary Debate Association (NPDA) is the largest collegiate sponsor; the American Parliamentary Debating Organization is the standards body for the east coast. There is currently no national sponsor for High School Parli debate.
In Canada, the Canadian Universities Society for Intercollegiate Debating (CUSID) is the main umbrella organization for the university-level debating.
World Schools Style
World Schools Style or WSS is a debating style fairly easy to learn, but very rewarding to practice. Each team has three speakers:
- First speaker of the Proposition (speaks for 8 minutes, presents the case of the Proposition, defines the motion, gives 2/3 of the arguments of the Proposition)
- First speaker of the Opposition (speaks for 8 minutes, may accept the definitions or contest them and give an alternative, rebuts Proposition arguments, presents the case of the Opposition, gives 2/3 of the arguments of the Opposition).
- Second speaker of the Proposition (speaks for 8 minutes, further develops the case of the Proposition, rebuts the arguments of the first speaker of the Opposition, gives 1/3 of the arguments of the Proposition)
- Second speaker of the Opposition (speaks for 8 minutes, further develops the case of the Opposition, rebuts the arguments given by the second speaker of the Proposition, gives 1/3 of the arguments of the Opposition)
- Third speaker of the Proposition (speaks for 8 minutes, rebuilds the case of the Proposition, rebuts the arguments of the second speaker of the Opposition, concludes case)
- Third speaker of the Opposition (speaks for 8 minutes, rebuilds the case of the Opposition, rebuts the arguments of the second speaker of the Opposition - may not introduce a new argument!)
- Reply speaker of the Opposition (speaks for 4 minutes, outlines clash point, evaluates debate, gives the final appeal) - either the first or the second speaker of the Opposition, usually the first
- Reply speaker of the Proposition (speaks for 4 minutes, outlines clash point, evaluates debate, has the last word in protected time!) - either the first or the second speaker of the Proposition, usually the first
During main speeches, members of the opposing team may offer Points of Information to express a question or brief remark, these shall not exceed 23 seconds or three sentences. First and last minutes of main speeches as well as the entire duration of reply speeches are protected, that means, no Points of Information may be offered. There is no cross-interrogation. The Proposition has to prove the motion for a reasonable majority of cases, while it is not enough for the Opposition to present reasonable doubt. The debate is decided by ballot of the uneven number of judges (usually 7 or 9). The grading of each team member on a range of 0 to 100, where style/content/strategy are divided 40/40/20, is summed and the reply speech is counted as 0-50 points, 20/20/10.
Simulated legislature
Other high school debate events such as Student Congress, Model United Nations, and the American Legion's Boys State and Girls State events are activities which are based on the premise of the contestants acting as representatives in a mock legislative body.
Moot court
Moot court or "mock court" or "mock trial" is expanding across the US as a high school activity.
Lincoln-Douglas debate
Lincoln-Douglas Debate, named after the famous series of Senate debates between the two candidates, has two participants who compete against each other. The arguments center around philosophy or abstract values, and thus it is also called a value debate. Lincoln-Douglas debate tends to require less evidence than policy debate, and thus emphasizes logic and reasoning. High school Lincoln-Douglas competitions are typically conducted under the rules of the National Forensic League (NFL) or the National Catholic Forensic League (CFL).
Policy Debate
In Policy Debate two teams of two students advocate or oppose a resolution calling for a change in policy by the government. The style of argumentation features extensive use of citations and quotations from news sources and technical material. In the US, high school policy debate is overseen by the NFL, the CFL and the NCFCA. Collegate policy debate is overseen by the National Debate Tournament, the Cross Examination Debate Association, the National Educational Debate Association, and the Great Plains Forensic Conference. Format often involves cross examination.
The expansion of Mock Court and Parli have come at the cost of the shrinking of participation in LD and Policy Debate in US High School competition since 1995.
Policy Debate-style competitions are highly popular outside the North American continent, with many nations competing in the World Debating Championship.
Balloon debate
A Balloon debate is one in which members argue the merits of their chosen subject (normally a person or profession) so as not to get voted out of the balloon.
Debate tournaments
High school speech tournaments are held every week during the season. Regional tournamnents, often held in high schools, attract other local teams. Major tournaments (such as Harvard's) attract students from the national circuit. The various national championships attract debaters from all over the country as well as from overseas. Many organizations hold national championship tournaments inclduing the NFL national championships, CFL, NCFCA, CDA and NDT. The US national championships include teams from former US territories and protectorates including the Panama Canal Zone, American Samoa and Guam. In the state of Texas, the Texas Forensics Association holds a list and schedule of tournaments it deems "qualifying tournaments" for the TFA state tournament. Note that this is separate from the Texas University Interscholastic League tournament held for debate events. Similarly in Kansas qualification for the Kansas State High School Activities Association (KSHSAA) regional and state championships is distinct from the CFL and NFL district qualifiers in Kansas.
TOC
The term "Tournament of Champions" is used throughout the debate community for the championship tournaments of a variety of circuits and at the state level. Generally however the term TOC in the high school community most commonly refers to the University of Kentucky TOC (Tournament of Champions) held each spring in Lexington, Kentucky. .
Amoung U.S. high school policy debators TOC is one of the most prestigious tournaments on the national circuit. Unlike CFL and NFL national tournaments to which teams are qualified by winning their district championships, TOC teams qualify by winning or placing at designated highly competative national circuit tournaments. This stylistic distinction results in a vastly different pool of competators for the different championships. TOC teams typically are representatives of well funded private, or underwritten public school teams, able to afford national circuit competition and who are allowed onto the national circuit by their state rules. Note that debaters in many circuits are not eligible to compete for TOC. Kansas schools, for example, are forbidden by the Kansas State High School Activities Association from participating at tournaments outside Kansas with the exception of CFL and NFL nationals.
The district qualification mechanism of CFL and NFL result in a much broader pool of well qualified teams, but high school debators on the national circuit tend to denigrate this due to the other stylistic differences. CFL and NFL tournaments feature judging by judges provided by the school. Many of these are local-circuit judges or even lay judges. CFL and NFL debate therefore, is characterised by communication skills and argumentation at the lay judge level. TOC judging is almost exclusively the franshise of college debators, and therefore features technical debate arguments. The stylistic difference is almost unresolvable.
Parli tournaments
Collegiate parlimentary debate tournaments are held weekly during the season (which typically runs from the fall until the early spring). Some leagues (APDA for instance) host championship tournaments at the end of the season.
Other forms of debate
Online debating
With the increasing popularity and availability of the Internet to people, different opinions arise frequently. This paved the way for more formalized debating websites, typically in the form of online forums or bulletin boards. The debate style is interesting, as research and well thought out points and counterpoints are possible because of the obvious lack of time restraints (although practical time restraints usually are in effect, e.g., no more than 5 days between posts, etc.). Many people use this to strengthen their points, or drop their weaker opinions on things, many times for debate in formalized debates (such as the ones listed above) or for fun arguments with friends. The ease-of-use and friendly environments make new debaters welcome to share their opinions in many communities. Examples of online debating websites are shown in the external links.
U.S. presidential debates
Since the 1976 general election, debates between presidential candidates have been a part of U.S. presidential campaigns. Unlike debates sponsored at the high school or collegiate level, the participants, format, and rules are not independently defined. Nevertheless, in a campaign season heavily dominated by television advertisements, talk radio, sound bites, and spin, they still offer a rare opportunity for citizens to see and hear the two major candidates side-by-side. The format of the presidential debates, though defined differently in every election, is typically more restrictive than many traditional formats, forbidding participants to ask each other questions and restricting discussion of particular topics to short time frames.
The presidential debates were initially sponsored by the League of Women Voters, though since 1988 the two major political parties have taken over the process. In 2004, the Citizens' Debate Commission was formed in the hope of establishing an independent sponsor for presidential debates, with a more voter-centric role in the definition of the participants, format, and rules.
See also
International University Debating
High School Debating
Other
External links
National and local debate organizations
- National Forensic League U.S. standards body for high school speech and debate
- National Association of Urban Debate Leagues - debate league for urban schools
- National Educational Debate Association
- Canadian Universities Society for Intercollegiate Debating
- Oxford Union debating society
- Ontario Student Debating Union
- Chicago Debate League
- Charles University Debate Club, the oldest Central European university's debate club
Other related websites
- Dutch Debate Institute commercial Institute focused on transferring the classical principles of debate to widely usable debating concepts focused on results.
- Cross-X dot com A resource and forum site for those involved in the high school policy debate world
- LD Debate dot org A resource and forum site for those involved in the high school Lincoln-Douglas debate world
- Big Sky Debate A source for debate research from Big Sky Debate, a vendor of debate products
- Online Debate Network - An online debating community
- Public domain information on Debate and Communication Skills from a private ad-supported website
- Objectivism Online - An online debating community for fans of objectivism, run by two students
- Debate Outreach Network - A resource for starting a debate team. Includes video from the Dartmouth Debate Institute
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