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Re: Racism and Relevancy of Debate
In my experience, just about everyone who attends anything more than
a couple tournaments gets pressure from someone outside the community
to cut back. Parental pressure at the high school level extends across
almost all racial lines. In my program, the first debate experience
often occurs during a student's first year of high school. This is
a time when a young person begins to spend more free time away from
home, and debate is a catalyst for family conflicts that (I think)
would inevitably happen. It is part of a lifelong pattern, young
people push boundaries trying to establish an identity and parents
resist.
I had never thought of family pressure as a racial issue before. But
it does make some sense. Certain subgroups expect their young people
to perform certain roles. And debate does conflict with those roles.
You are probably a better predictor of the reactions that Asian-
American families have to debate, but my guess is that they will be
as individual as any other group.
One pattern that I have observed this year is that a beginning female
debater is more likely to get pressure to quit or cutback debate than
male debaters in my program. Most of my first year students are 15,
too young to get a job in Washington. Quite a few of the young women
in my program limit their debate activities because they need to
provide child care for their younger siblings or cook dinner for
their families. I have never had a male debater tell me that they
were cutting debate so they can meet family obligations. This probably
tells us something about our culture.
--
Michael D. Kobeski Assistant Director of Debate
mikeski@eskimo.com Policy Debate Coach
mikeski329@aol.com Puyallup High School
References:
Archive created by Jonathan Stanton (jonathan@cs.jhu.edu)
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