Gifted Tongues : High School Debate and Adolescent Culture

Rating:
Summary: A good guide to what debate's really about
Review: Fine is a sociologist, and so you find out a lot here about the culture of debate. I found this right on target as both an old regional policy debater (similar to the Minnesota teams profiled in the book) and the parent of a national circuit policy debater (similar to the teams Fine's son participated in). Fine does a great job explaining the differences between these and the tension between them.
There's NO debate theory or how-to in this book -- but then those books don't really contain a consideration of the culture of debate, either.

Rating:
Summary: ATTN: High School Policy Debaters and Coaches
Review: I debated in the National Forensics League and the Urban Debate League for two years, and GIFTED TONGUES does a never-before-seen job in detailing the high school policy debate sub-culture. GIFTED TONGUES is the only book in the market that goes into the workings of several modern high school policy debate teams. Other books that claim to attempt to describe policy debate are out of date with the times.

GIFTED TONGUES might not have much insight into complex policy theory, but it's defintely worth your time if you're a novice HS debater OR a debate coach who wants advice to increase team membership, watch for pitfalls, and promote team morale.