Duo Interpretive Speech: Fill & Download for Free

A2AWhat's the creepiest thing you've encountered while working in forensics?I will get to the creepy part.I don’t know how many of you other nerds like me are aware, but competitive High School speech and debate was known as “forensics” until the name of the National Forensic League was changed in 2014. It may not be the forensics you were thinking about when you asked, but it’s the one I’m qualified to discuss.That was only 6 years ago.”The National Speech and Debate Association is an American student debating society. It was established in 1925 as the National Forensic League; the name was changed in 2014.”Here’s another great fact: before they changed the name, the National Forensic League was known in abbreviation as “the NFL”. This hilarity was not lost on me (or anyone) as a High School student living in Texas.Best team of competitive High School forensics nerds ever! Oh, to be a young NFL competitor in Texas.I was a High School Lincoln Douglas debater. I considered CX debate because I can talk really fast which is an important skill for that, but I didn’t get around to trying it and did LD from 8th grade in Pennsylvania until I graduated High School in Texas. I also competed in Extemporaneous Speaking. And once or twice for fun as a Senior, I did a Duo Interpretation with a friend because the theater kids who traveled with us were super fun.So let’s break this down to the terms because you are either traveling home with me mentally right now or you have absolutely no idea what I’m talking about.My areas of competitive Forensics back in the day were:LD Debate:“Lincoln–Douglas debate (commonly abbreviated as LD Debate, or simply LD) is a type of one-on-one debate practiced mainly in the United States at the high school level. It is sometimes also called values debate because the format traditionally places a heavy emphasis on logic, ethical values, and philosophy… The Lincoln–Douglas Debate format is named for the 1858 Lincoln–Douglas Debates between Abraham Lincolnand Stephen A. Douglas, because their debates focused on slavery and the morals, values, and logic behind it…LD debate follows the basic time schedule 6 - 3 - 7 - 3 - 4 - 6 - 3. Each debater gets thirteen minutes of speaking time, and three minutes of question time. The rounds rounds take approximately 45 minutes. Each debater receives four to five minutes of prep time to use between speeches however they like…Asking cross-examination questions during prep time is generally accepted on the national circuit…”If you already knew all of that, right now you are daydreaming of flowcharts on your notebook format of choice (I liked long legal lads where the margin made a clear column), multicolored pens that did not run out of ink at bad times (to annotate clearly in your notes your opponents initial argument and your point by point rebuttal as they spoke, their rebuttal to that, points you had not responded to and cross examination questions as they arose), stress, and crazy catharsis in whatever random cafeteria between rounds.You also know that the topics to be debated change every two months (resolutions) and that you have to prepare both a positive and negative ethical value position on resolutions like:Resolved: The United States ought to limit qualified immunity for police officers. (November/December 2016)orResolved: In the United States criminal justice system, jury nullification ought to be used in the face of perceived injustice. (November/December 2015)orResolved: Just government ought to ensure food security for their citizens. (March/April 2015)During competition you will argue both of your prepared sides at some point and can be called to represent either side during any round.ExtempThis was my favorite event. As I moved up into High School and had conflicting responsibilities (like editing the newspaper) I had less time to prepare value resolutions. But I could still place in Extemp. You mostly needed a good memory and to speak like you meant it. My Achilles heel was remembering to slow down when talking.“Extemporaneous speaking (extemp) is a limited-preparation speech event based on research and original analysis. Extemporaneous speaking is a competitive speaking event in the United States in both high school and college forensics competition. Extemporaneous speaking provides 30 minutes of preparation time, followed by a seven-minute speech. When preparation starts, speakers are offered three questions to answer. Questions are based on current affairs, and topic areas generally include international and domestic policy, economic policy, and social or scientific issues. Speakers generally speak persuasively, though some areas of the US offer informative speeches.”And finallyDuoI only tried this a couple of times, but it was a blast. If I could go back to High School again (which I would not) I would do some theater:Duo Interpretation, or often simply called Duo Interp, or just Duo, is an official speech event…The event involves a pair of performers acting out a literary piece or program under certain restraints, including not making eye contact with and touching your partner, and no props. Pieces used often include published books, movies, short stories, plays, or poems. Participants may cut anything out of their piece, but cannot add any dialogue. This event can either be dramatic or humorous…Like other interpretation events, props and costumes are not allowed, and the performers rely on things such as pantomime to convey what is happening…Interpretation is highly valued in this event. Performances may be dramatic, humorous, or a blend of both. Performers often twist the meanings of words for comic effect or play on an unintentional pun. Other common ways to change the meaning of the text is to sing, dance, gesture, or simply change the tone of your voice.”We lost every single time, and it was FANTASTIC.Sorry to you CX/ policy debaters. I am linking to your event at the bottom of the citations. I did always find your event fascinating: shout out to the guy in my district who was always trying to fund things with a national toilet paper tax. It would rack up a lot of money fast…But I don’t think it would be very popular.I didn’t enjoy Student Congress (Legislative Debate!) when I tried it but I am providing a link to that too. You guys, I am not a politician but it really does suck to be filibustered, just trust me.Most of this was great though- I went on to double major in college inclusive of a degree focused on the Philosophy of Ethics (Law, Morality, and Society), and took some great logic electives.So, anyway what’s the creepiest thing I encountered in all of this?Well they corrected it six years ago, remember?It was definitely that my speech and debate competitions shared a name with the practice of diagnostic work surrounding crime scenes, often corpses.It really contextualized a few conversations about being off to a High School forensics competition— Hold on to your formaldehyde! I’m off to speak extemporaneously!!National Speech and Debate Association - WikipediaLincoln–Douglas debate format - WikipediaExtemporaneous speaking - WikipediaDuo Interpretation - WikipediaHumorous Interpretation - WikipediaPolicy debate - WikipediaCongressional Debate - WikipediaNational Speech & Debate Association

In debate events, definitely policy (yes, I am a policy debater, but 1. no other event has a year-long topic and requires the same depth of research and assumed knowledge, 2. I know someone with over 14 career TOC bids in LD and only 2 in policy and 3. it is the original form of debate—LD, parliamentary and public forum are all offshoots of it).For speech events, I’m not as versed in what’s considered prestigious (although I’ve competed in impromptu, humorous interpretation, duo interpretation, extemporaneous, oratory, SPAR, and editorial commentary, so I do know something about them) but in my experience there seems to be a hierarchy (in prestige and point values by NSDA for rounds won/lost) where oratory is on top, followed by the interp events, and then the top-of-your-head events like extemp or impromptu. SPAR and ed com are barely even considered speech events, as you can’t qualify for Nationals on them, and they’re basically just for fun. However, I don’t know if this hierarchy exists outside of my school/district, so I’m interested to see if any speech competitors have any input on this.

tl;dr I felt excitement, elation, and a searing pain from burning my face on an iron. Dirty socks were to blame.The National TournamentI won the high school Lincoln Douglas Debate National Championship[1] in 1999.[2] The first four days had seen the tournament whittle its thousands of contestants down for a day-long event in the Phoenix Convention Center in front of a couple thousand(?) spectators -- way more than the ~50 max from all previous tournaments.In many ways it felt like a TV Series Finale. My teammate Ben[3] & I had seen these debaters and their coaches about once/month over four years in high school. We'd spent even more time with them each summer during 2-4 week debate camps. This would be our last encounter with most of these people before heading off to college & losing track of them for 10 years until Facebook reconnected us.Ben & I made our way through most of the tournament without too much difficulty. We won most or all of our prelims[4] and blazed through the Rounds 7-11 of the double elimination portion. Ben dropped a round to Ben Davidson, our fiercest rival and then was eliminated in Round 15 on what we all agreed was a totally bum decision. Good enough for 6th place and a rad trophy. I lost round 15 to Ben Davidson, but beat him in the 17th to make it to Round 18, the final round.The Final DayThe tournament ended on a Friday, with all ~18[5] events taking place between 8am and 5pm in the Phoenix Convention Center. I got up at 7am for our 11am round and stupidly burned my face on an iron.[6] I spent the next two hours holding an ice cube to my face instead of warming up for the competition (doing 15-20 minutes of speaking to get any stammers out of my system & loading up the medium-term memory with all of my practiced responses to common arguments). The round itself[7] wasn't great. Neither Max (the other finalist) or I were at our best.What the Winning Felt LikeWe had to wait for a while for the votes to be tabulated. I think the final decision was 8-3 or 10-3. It was unusual to have so many judges, but it was a good reminder that when you only have one or even 3 judges, you can lose a round even when most people think that you won. Max and I were friends (we'd been roommates at a debate camp the previous year), so we were both pretty happy to be in the final round. After the announcement, I collected my trophy (a 3-foot tall pewter Nike(?) on a pedestal), a lei (no idea), and a small marble bust of Abraham Lincoln (the event was Lincoln-Douglas Debate). After the pictures were taken, the elation and searing pain really settled in for the next couple of weeks.The AftermathMy face eventually healed; I don't even have a scar. Winning the national championship was awesome, but because the tournament happened after the school year was over, there really wasn't anyone to tell. Three months later I was at college and letting freshman know you were a national debate champion just isn't a good way to make friends or impress people.[1] There were two* 'national championships' that we paid attention to. The biggest and most widely recognized 'nationals' were put on by the National Forensic League in June every year after local qualifying tournaments in the spring - the NFL Nationals. I think they claimed that ~8,000 students participated in the qualifying tournaments each year, narrowing to a couple hundred for the big tournament itself. The judging was a little random due to the size of the tournament and regional differences in style (imagine gymnastics being judged by random Physical Education teachers -- there's going to be broad agreement, but occasionally wacky results are going to happen). The other national championship was held by the University of Kentucky & was called the "Tournament of Champions" (the TOC). You qualified by reaching a certain level at major tournaments during the year. The tournament was smaller (maybe 80 people), and the judging was more consistent. So, winning the TOC was more respected by other debaters, but the NFL Nationals was better known.[2] Here is (and I can't believe I'm voluntarily publishing this photo of 18 year-old me) the 1999 Rostrum with coverage of the national tournament. I'm the kid in the top row between the "S" and "T" of Rostrum. I'm not sure why we had leis.[3] Lincoln-Douglas debate was an individual event, but because there were just two of us debating, we wrote our cases together, practiced arguments together, and for the most part, succeeded or failed together. Between us, I think one or the other of us won about half the nationally-attended tournaments we attended our senior year, and closed out one of the major invitational round robins and the Glenbrooks tournament. I remain immensely proud of what we achieved together.[4] Nationals, like most debate tournaments, had 6 preliminary rounds consisting of 2 randomly-assigned opponents followed by 4 power-matched rounds (i.e., the 2-0s debated the 2-0s, 1-1s debated 1-1s, ranked using the subjective 'speaking points' assigned in each round).[5] There were 19 champions, but one guy won two(!) events & two of the events (Duo Interpretation and Policy Debate) were 2-on-2 contests.[6] How did this happen? How did I burn a cleft-palate-looking scar into my upper lip an hour before the final round of the National Debate Tournament? Here's how. I hate wearing dirty socks. I mean, I *really* hate it. I only brought four pairs of dress socks to the tournament because it seemed unlikely that I'd need five (i.e., that I'd be in the final round). So, the night before, I'd hand-washed a pair of socks in the sink and left them to dry. In the morning, they were still wet, so I thought "Oh! I'll just use the iron to dry them out." Ben had just ironed his shirt & unplugged the iron, so leaned down to plug it back in (the outlet was behind a credenza in the room). At that moment, the phone rang. Our coach was calling to see if we were ready. I leaned forward to let Ben walk behind me to answer the phone and bumped my head into a pointy sconce on the wall. When you hit your head, you recoil, and I just happened to recoil downward into the still-hot point of the iron.**[7] Super interested in what a final round looks like? It looks like this: http://nfltv.org/2009/11/04/1999-phoenix-nationals/*I believe the Catholic Forensic League also held a 'national tournament,' but it was not as well attended and didn't draw from a truly national base, so it didn't come up very often.** You know how some injuries put you into shock & you don't even realize that you're hurt? This wasn't like that. Giant, searing pain that evolved into a giant searing throb over the course of a day. We called an Emergency Department and they told me 1. I was stupid for putting my face on an iron and 2. Take some Advil; this is going to hurt a lot for a while.