You might expect to have fights in a relationship, but when you’re dating another member of the debate team it’s par for the course.
“Many people find their life-long friends on the circuit and some even find their significant others,” said Amanda Fuller ’07, president of the debate team, the Woodrow Wilson Debate Society. “Many of our team members have dated other debaters either on our team or from other schools, and two of our officers are currently involved romantically with debaters from other schools, myself included.”
Indeed, because debates are usually two-day events that take place on weekends, they are particularly conducive to camaraderie, in addition to the development of rhetorical skills.
Toni Latimer ’09 not only met her two best friends on the team, but found romance with her debate partner, John Chisholm ’09.
“Some people go to every single tournament and the same people go every week so you get to hang out with them every week,” Latimer said.
Perhaps because tournaments last two days, not all members of the team choose to attend regularly, or even at all. Those who do, however, describe the experience as intensely competitive yet friendly.
“It’s pretty much ridiculous,” said Laura Silver ’08. “A lot of them tend to be power-hungry people. But if you take it with a grain of salt, it’s a lot of fun.”
“Debaters tend to spend much of their free time with each other, and get to know members of other teams as well as they know some people on their own campuses,” Fuller said.
Silver said that, unlike teams such as those at Harvard and Yale, the climate within Wesleyan’s team is supportive.
“We tend to have no competition among ourselves,” Silver said.
The team follows a style called the American Parliamentary Debate Style, in which two two-person teams face off in six rounds, and each side has three opportunities to argue its case. Unlike some other styles, American Parliamentary Debate Style values quick thinking over thorough research.
“Parliamentary style is based more on the knowledge and skill of the debater than the research done before the round, and fosters much better articulation, more complete argumentation, and the rewards the wit and quick-thinking of a person within a round,” Fuller said.
Although it’s easy to equate debate with political subject matter, the topics of debates run the gamut from economics to literature to history. Silver, who will take over as president next year, said her favorite resolution was “Penelope of Ithaca should have divorced Odysseus.”
And yet, no background research is necessary.
“It’s more about thinking on your feet and thinking critically,” said Victoria Belyavsky ’07, who was heavily involved with the team her freshman and sophomore years. “You prepare speeches while listening to them.”
Tournaments take place almost every weekend and debaters usually must travel off campus. They consist of five in-rounds, in which all competitors participate. The eight highest teams continue onto a single elimination tournament called out-rounds. The team that wins its three out-rounds wins the tournament.
The team has fared well in recent competitions. Fuller and Abby Hinchcliff ’08 finished 17th at the National Tournament. They were just one rank away from making the 16-team single elimination round.
According to Silver, the team trains its members before sending them to tournaments. In addition to practice rounds, the team teaches its novices various strategies in constructing and refuting arguments.
“We talk about how you would argue a case you know nothing about,” Silver said.
This training is available even to those who choose not to compete. Fuller said that much of the team is comprised of CSS majors, whose academic schedules preclude them from attending out-of-town tournaments regularly.
“Even in a liberal arts education there are few places to learn effective speaking,” Fuller said. “We learn how to convey our thoughts on paper, but many people still have difficulty speaking in class or conveying their opinions in a subtle, complete way. I think the ability to speak well and communicate with yours peers makes you a far more effective member of a classroom, community, or business.”
For many students, the debate community is a welcome respite from political discussions that are at times one-sided.
“There are actually Republicans around, which isn’t true of Wesleyan,” Belyavsky said. “You hear about issues you don’t hear about on campus. And I like to hear the non-Wesleyan side.”
Others say that the structure of the debates, and not the debaters themselves, allow them to experience a broader spectrum of ideas.
“Almost everyone on the debate team tends to be liberal,” Silver said. “But we’re forced to access the other side of the argument in a way that not everyone else is.”
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