The New York Sophist

First of all, here’s an American Debate Semifinal for you to have a look at. Lots of reliance on cited sources and files in this format, you might notice. Deep research is the key to doing well in these debates.

When I was a high school debate coach, I made sure to always have an excellent and close relationship with the librarians. It was essential. The librarians would become staunch allies once they saw the research and writing skills that policy debate developed in students. When students started spending more time at the library before and after school searching for “evidence,” then the librarians had no choice but to fall in love with debate. Near the end of my tenure in that position, the librarians would ask me about the upcoming topic for the next year – they wanted to use their resources to buy essential books and other resources for the coming competitive year.

When I moved to University coaching, I found the same thing – a close relationship with the library was essential. It was beyond question that you seek out your allied librarian to help you find unusual books and articles on the annual topic. That process of discovery was really fun.

I do miss it, although I am enjoying exploring the fairly new territory (at least in the US) of WUDC debating. Of course, the librarians still know me well, but it’s mostly for my personal or professional research interests, not for the debate topic, per se. I do keep the campus news pipeline full of information about what we are doing in debate, but I think they feel a bit left out.  From time to time they ask me, “What’s the library’s role in all this?” The American assumption is that one collects lots of information, processes it, assembles a case, and then goes to debate (see the film The Great Debaters for an example of how entrenched this is).  The reason is that American debating has always been a practice modeled on adversarial decision-making (as opposed to creative or cooperative argumentation). In WUDC format, the process is different – and sometimes can be the opposite – you go seek out information after debating something because, well bluntly, you did a terrible job in putting a relevant case together. We perform some research in a general sense on various topics that we think may come up in a debate. But that research is quite different from what I used to do as a policy coach.

This article made me think that perhaps the change is in both directions. The contemporary University Library is becoming more of an information literacy center rather than a place to discover (or uncover) the dusty tomes of fact to bolster your belief.  It seems, at least from the tone of the article, that the library at most Universities is transforming itself into a place that serves in the formation of belief and opinion via information processing – one of the ways debate is valuable as a pedagogical activity as well.

This tone circulates around re-appropriation of space, resources, personnel and more. It seems to graft onto, almost directly, the recent trend in the United States of “paperless debating” – debating from a laptop instead of paper files. Still a long way off from being universal, I think, but it’s coming. I think the library is moving this way too.  Whatever the previous relationship with your library, you stand to gain something from being involved in an official capacity as a debater. Whatever new resources you might need or want for your debating experience, it seems now is the time to develop, or re-develop, that library relationship.

Policy debate and WUDC debate, the two formats I’m most familiar with, are also facing the stimulus that is behind these changes for the library. Perhaps you and your club should take stock of your relationship to the library and how familiarity at a time of great change can improve both of these vital parts of your University.

I was having coffee with a good friend of mine and colleague from the debating world recently, when the subject of debate theory came up. My colleague mused about how lucky American debaters were to have such a rich tradition of theory behind what they do.

At the time, I disagreed. I like BP/WUDC debating because ideally it acts atheoretically. The arguments occur in natural language, and the debate about “what counts” as an argument doesn’t happen beyond the point of calling out a fallacy, a weak warrant, or a fabrication. Argument theory as it exists in American debate formats relies extensively on argument theory as a block to arguments made, and therefore theoretical arguments (i.e. Your model is not a theoretically acceptable model because it does not specify which agent will enact the model) are as much the heart of the debate as the research, evidence, and disadvantages\advantages. In BP, arguments are not theoretically rejected per se, they are rejected upon the grounds of their persuasiveness.

Argumentation wise I still hold this view, but recent judging experiences and recent adjudications have me thinking that the adjudication system needs a method and a theoretical justification behind it.

Here are some things on my mind considering adjudication that debate scholars could and should address:

1. When, if ever, are solo judged rooms ok?
It seems to me that there are possible justifications for this, but I am not convinced by any of them as they all rely on the theory of “judge as expert in argumentation.” This theory is a carry over (hold over?) from American policy debate, a format that I believe operates under a theory of creating a forum to practice persuasion among simulated experts. BP on the other hand appears to operate under the idea of practicing persuasion for a simulated public. The loss of the simulated public change the game to a simulated expert appeal, with debaters practicing a narrowing of argumentation for the one specific adjudicator’s tastes instead of broadening appeal for a whole panel. This is distinct from American policy debate panels where you can go for 2 of the panel and ignore the outlier judge.

2. Is the purpose of paneled judging to reach consensus or to agree?
During a recent final round where I was a panelist, we went to adjudicate where the chair asked us for an initial idea as to who won. When we all said what we thought, he said “okay” and started to walk back in. I protested, saying we need to discuss the decision. The response was amusement. “Why talk if we all agree? Should we pretend to disagree?” I didn’t have a good response other than a gut feeling that simple agreement was not the telos of consensus judging. I think some work here using theories of deliberation, discussion and the re-articulation of argument in the public sphere might help us appreciate the consensus portion of the adjudication more than the agreement portion of the deliberation.

On the verso, what happens when there is no discussion, or a discussion that goes past each other? What happens when a wing refuses to accept the community norms? My situation as a chair was having a wing who refused to judge the debate on the community norm of “who was most persuasive?” He said it was a bad way he didn’t buy, and he was an argumentation expert. When I forced him to talk about persuasiveness, he couldn’t – he talked about their style in a superficial manner. What can be said or done about such a judge? It seems a body of theory would help bend this sort of judge to a more reasonable and more functional role within the BP community.

3. Are wing judges extra judges? Are chairs expert judges?
By now I suppose you realize I’m going to say no to both. But the scholarly potentials here are interesting. What if the role of the chair is not expert on debate, but discussion leader? I think the decision becomes a different one if that’s the function of the chair. If the function of the chair is to be expert, are they a technical one or one based upon experience? Either way will change the function of the adjudication.

As far as wings go, I think most people accept the idea that wings are chairs in training. This is a fantastic charitable attitude that I think does not exist outside of this format. The strike system in American policy has eliminated the idea of judge training, as well as the idea that rhetors should alter their message for audiences.

A strike system (this means choosing adjudicators that will not hear you during a tournament) is a move more toward a truth-seeking or positivist format of debating. However, some say should be given to debaters about the variety of judges that will hear them. After all, in rhetorical situations, many rhetors select whom they address and do not speak to all or everyone. Perelman even points out keenly that philosophers who claim to be addressing the universal are imagining that category based upon the best critical qualities of thought of their era.

The wing system theoretically addresses this problem by putting judges in the chair that are “trusted” which mean, I think, are consistent with the best sorts of judging of the era. They are to act as expert in some ways, but through guiding the discussion and making sure all wings are heard. Another theory might be that the chair can persuade the wings as to his or her credibility, so the panel is more like a simulated segment of the public, rallied to vote in one way or another by an enthusiastic citizen. And I’m sure there are other models that might be instructive to pursue.

Unfortunately there is no theory to support all of this yet, and often panelists are thought of extra judges. Panels of 3 are common, when a panel of 5 would be more justified. A 3 person panel indicates the need for a split in a solo, expert based decision process without consensus. Rounds are run with a solo judge under the assumption that it will be just the same as if there were wings. But I like so many other chairs know that many times a wing has caught some detail that makes me re think my orientation to the debate. This is an invaluable element of the debate, key to the format, and a backing of some scholarly work on the theory of BP debating would make it easier and more consistent, especially among Americans where the tradition of expert, professional scholar-coaches is bending WUDC format away from the elements that make it unique and pedagogically vibrant.

ImportVideo processing failed. — Download Johnnyplato-35thEastWestTournamentFinalTokyoJune2009554.avi

ImportVideo processing failed. — Download Johnnyplato-35thEastWestTournamentFinalTokyoJune2009554.avi

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Here is the final round from the East-West tournament in early June. We were invited to judge, but had some difficulty with the format. Here are some things to keep in mind as you watch the clip.

1. The clip begins with the entry of the 11 judge final round panel. Everyone stands up and applauds them, and as they come in they distribute copies of their judging philosophies to the debaters. This gives the debaters only a few minutes to make adaptations in strategy. There is a short moment of polling of the judges by the Negative team in Japanese, and the judges raised their hands to indicate their agreement with the statements.

2. Yes, the debate is in English! In Academic debate (what the Japanese call policy debate) the pronunciation of words has its own very difficult accent. The judges and the participants have developed their own pronunciation for English words over the years. They told me that we might have trouble understanding because the competition often favors “Japanese-English” – which is what they call this way of speaking. I have great difficulty understanding most of these speeches. I don’t think Academic Debate is very interested in teaching English speaking so much at this level, similar to how policy debate has little interest in teaching good public speaking skills in the U.S.

3. Topicality is a challenge to a debate over definitions. It has little to do with the plan. Academic debate is pretty lacking in theory debate. Everyone is a hypo tester, and the T argument challenges the Aff to a battle over interpretation of words. That’s why the second T violation sounds so strange – she basically reads definitions for half the resolution, so it’s multiple challenges in one. The Aff handles it pretty well in the 2AC by lumping it as a debate about the meaning of “Japanese Government.”

4. Counterplans claim mutual exclusivity, but what they really mean is resolutional competition. That is, you can’t endorse the resolution and the counterplan at the same time. More like a counterwarrant that has just crawled up on the beach from the primordial sea than a modern counterplan.

5. At the end is every policy debater’s dream – the chairperson asks “Is there any appeal from the Negative?” – After the 2AR the Negative is given one last opportunity to appeal to the judges, especially indicating new arguments in the 2AR. Amazing. Rarely do Negative teams invoke this opportunity, I was told.

6. I love the fact that they have people coloring in boxes of chalk on the board to indicate prep time use! Gives it a very game-show feel don’t you think?

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The processing of videos is slower than I thought it would be, sorry for the slowness. This is a good debate to start with though. The last debate on the final day of the tour versus Sophia University was a huge suprise. First, it was in an intimate, private setting with only 5 observers, all of whom participate in the Japanese policy format they call “Academic Debate.” Secondly, it was the most American styled policy debate that happened on the tour. This was very surprising to me as the debate seemed very familiar. Finally, this debate really highlights some of the differences in Japanese “academic debate” and U.S. “policy debate.” The major difference is that academic debate accepts hypothesis testing as the only way to make a decision in a round. This becomes a nice moment of cultural communication between the teams over the counterplan in this round.

The topic was That the Japanese Government should encourage companies to introduce equal pay for equal work.

I made it back to the U.S. safely, and can’t imagine how the time went by so quickly. Thanks to everyone in the JDA and NCA for making the trip possible.

Amazing. Overwhelming and thought provoking are three terms that might sum up the whole experience.

Today over coffee I am returning to the Eastern Time Zone, and thinking about all the photos and videos I need to process over the next couple of days. I will probably run to campus on Friday to do a bit of work, but today is strictly recovery, laundry and organizing. I have a huge amount of video and photo material, but also paper, posters, gifts and souvenirs that all need a place to live.

I am home now, but I would go back tomorrow if they asked me to. Debate in Japan is so rich and so vibrant that it is a shame they don’t have a place for professional coaches in the school system there. They rely at the high school level on willing, eager English teachers, and at the University level it is student run almost entirely.

I hope to return one day for a longer period to study the details of academic debate and how it has developed on a parallel and very different track from NDT/CEDA debate. People who say that the Japanese do policy debate are only half right.