Topicality
What is topicality?
We’ll talk about topicality (T) now.
Topicality contests the aff’s connection to the topic. Different types of judges define the necessary connection differently. For now, the thing you should pay attention to is how negs contest the aff’s connection.
The way negs do this is by reading definitions. I’ll paste an example from the nuclear arsenals topic here:
Definitions establish the neg’s proposed rule, or interpretation, regarding words in the resolution.
The next part is the violation, which explains why the aff doesn’t “meet” the rule’s requirements. Some people read cards here. The two point above could also fit there.
The next part is the standard, which explains why the proposed model of debate is good/why the aff’s model is bad. Arguments always center around a few concepts. Limits is the idea that bigger topics are bad for the negative because they increase the prep burden and thus decrease depth. Ground concerns the quality/quantity of arguments on both sides. Predictability has two parts. One part, predictability of aff, says that definitions should be chosen to discourage affs that are hard for negs to discover. Another part, predictability of definition, says that the definitions we should use in debate are those that are the easiest to find, since they’ll dictate topic prep the most.
The fourth part is the external impacts, aka the voters. External impacts are almost always to fairness and education in policy T debates, although debaters who go for T vs non-topical critical affirmatives will sometimes argue other impacts like fun, clash, research, or specific types of education.
“Paradigm issues,” or the ways that judge should evaluate T, fall under voters as well. I’ll talk about those in a bit after discussing aff responses to T.
Affs should almost always make a counter-interpretation. This includes reading definitions and arguing that a different model of debate (whose rules obviously have to include the aff) is superior to the negative’s. Counterinterpretations should have standard-level arguments but shouldn’t contain a violation for obvious reasons—the aff by definition has to meet the counterinterp for the counterinterp to be legitimate. Affs can also make an I/we meet, which says that there is no violation of the negative’s rule.
Taking that into account, I’ll now talk about how paradigm issues work.
The first paradigm issue to consider is competing interpretations versus reasonability. Competing interps argues that the burden lies with the affirmative to prove a better model of debate. Reasonability on the other hand says that the burden lies with the negative to prove that there’s a substantial difference between the two. Under reasonability, affs can win solely off of defense if they prove there’s little risk of neg offense. This is the understanding of reasonability in policy and among many LD judges. However, there is another understanding that a lot of judges, especially on the east coast/Midwest, buy.
This reasonability doesn’t need a counterinterp. It basically just says that if the judge thinks the aff is reasonable, either by intuition or some given standard, they should just ignore topicality. i don’t personally hold this view but it’s important not to be dogmatic about either view. You as the debater are the performer, and your performance has to be palatable to the other side.
The next two paradigm issues are “LD” paradigm issues in the sense that policy judges have either never heard of them or think they’re ridiculous. The first is “drop the argument,” whose implications were never clear to me. Often this means removing the plan from the aff and making it whole-rez. However some people take it as “reject the 1AC” which is the same as drop the debater minus possible shenanigans with theory or 1AR Ks.
The second is the reverse voting issue (RVI). This says that the aff should win if they win a topicality counterinterp regardless of whether the neg goes for T. It basically means that the neg can’t concede a counterinterpretation if they’d like to go for something else in the 2NR. Negs will either spend a bit answering the 1AR RVI argument, just go for T, or spend time elaborating the initial standards to make it hard for the aff to win a counterinterp. A lot of LD judges are skeptical of this argument but it can be smart to include as a blip/another source of offense coming out of the 1AR.
So we’ve gone over how to understand neg topicality interpretations and possible aff arguments. I’ll link some HS Impact articles for further reading with brief summaries at the beginning of each bullet.
- T basics: mailbag 1: how to articulate a precision argument, how to argue predictability of definition comes first, why T is a real argument, how to use T blocks, understanding judges who don’t like T, why K teams should read T, how to overcome bad T cards.
- T basics: mailbag 1.1: why short T 1NCs suck, why not having good answers is a good tip-off, why structure is important, how to understand T offense.
- What is reasonability?: on reasonability and its applications past topicality
- Answering some T questions: the library DA vs framework, extra-T, reasonability.
- Bad framework arguments are bad part 1: things wrong with other rounds solve, do it on the other side, tva, CX questions about flipping to go for framework, T-framework isn’t a strategy.
- Topicality basics 1: types of T judges, “keeping them honest,” advice against dumb arguments, developing nuance.
- Better 2AC – topicality 1: tips for the 1AR on T. Some of the points are in the context of a policy topic but it’s still useful to read the examples.
I’ll link some videos below so you can see good topicality in action.
- Northwestern JW vs Kentucky BT, 2019 NDT, Round the Sixth
- MBA GH vs Monta Vista PS, 2018 Cal RR, RD 3
(need more T rounds)
T-Framework
A subset of T that deserves its own category is commonly called T-Framework (or T-Defend the Topic). This is the argument that says untopical affs should lose. Affs that T-Framework is read against are always critical because only anti-liberal ideologies provide reasons why rules, traditional education, debate, communication, and/or fairness are bad. Jasmine Stidham has a very developed lecture on framework [here](https://hsimpact.wordpress.com/2018/07/14/umich-camp-lectures-12-framework/).
TODO
There is a bunch of HS Impact content related to framework (either on the AFF or the NEG). In other words, these articles are for advice on debating non-traditional teams. See the following: