Re: A question about debate theory

[Alan Dove <ad52@columbia.edu>]

On Mon, 3 Mar 1997, David Franklin Breshears wrote:

> your equation of "critique/kritik(ing)" with "critique(ing) advocacy". 
> "Advocacy" begs a host of theoretical questions (ie - does the "use" of
> evidence constitute endorsement of an author's language
> choice/"philosophical" assumptions [for lack of a better term]?), and

How does this beg the question of the underlying critique format?  I can
run a critique of your author's advocacy, and then you can say that the
author's underlying assumptions are irrelevant to his use as a support for
your case, or that you don't support those assumptions, or that my
critique of them is flawed.  We can argue about whether or not you have
endorsed a particular value, but this is not a problem on the theoretical
level.  For an analogy, you can argue that the standards for topicality
are hopelessly vague (there are multiple definitions of any term, so who
is right, and on what basis do we make such a determination?), but that
does not mean the argument is without a sound theoretical basis.

> mean to critique/kritik?  Tell me how your equation accounts for both
> "disciplinary power" and "social ecology", two arguments I'll defend as
> examples of kritiking, but which are fundamentally dissimilar.  Better
> yet, tell me why Rorty's "public/private" critical space argument

I have a hard time explaining how these definitions fit arguments when I
only see the tag lines to them.  "Social ecology," for example, can be run
as a disad, a counterplan, and a critique, and I've heard it mis-tagged
quite a few times (e.g. a disad that assumes exclusion of a particular
course of action, which is really a counterplan).  How are the two
"critiques" you cite "fundamentally dissimilar"?  Do they both critique
advocacy, or is one based on a disadvantage or alternative to plan action?

> make such blanket rejections.  The language that allows us to neatly
> discuss disads & counterplans (ie - as already-agreed-upon categories of
> argument with visible boundaries and mutual properties) is noticeably
> absent.  Moreover, disagreement about disad & counterplan theory
> demonstrates that even with such a language, there is room for
> theoretical dispute.  Such a glib dismissal hardly seems adequate. 

Which ultimately supports my point: we should not lift a term from one
branch of theory and apply it to mean something else in another framework. 
Co-opting or subsuming a critique is not the same thing as a "perm," and
saying it is further confuses the already muddled area of critique theory. 
I agree that critiques lack a community-accepted standard format and set
of norms (not the same as lacking a sound theoretical justification), and
this is one of the main reasons I think we should avoid haphazard choices
in our terminology.  There are consistent theoretical frameworks one can
use for critiques, but they are not yet widely used. 

          --Alan

__________________
Alan Dove
N3IMU
ad52@columbia.edu
http://128.59.173.136/Poliolab/Alan/Dove.html

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References:

• Re: A question about debate theory
• From: David Franklin Breshears <dbreshrs@jove.acs.unt.edu>

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