Author: Matt Liu, University of Wyoming Director of Debate
Quickdraw posts are snapshot reflections that are usually spurred by observations the WDR staff have while judging at Wyoming tournaments. This quickdraw is about sign-posting: what it is and how you should do it. Sign-posting is how you announce transitions between arguments during a speech. This is in contrast to roadmaps, which tell the judge the order you will address arguments before a speech begins. Roadmaps are also different because they only tell the judge what order to put their sheets of flow paper in ("the economy DA with an overview, then solvency, then the inequality advantage"), while sign-posting addresses moving between arguments on a flow and moving between flows. Sign-posting is how you do every transition between any argument, making sure the judge knows what you're answering and isn't getting lost. It's an incredibly important skill because if you're losing the judge, even for a second, less of your arguments are going to get through to the judge. The way we teach novices sign-posting is through "they say." For example, "they say 2AC number one, labor shortages now. That's wrong. First, ... ." However, that method is inefficient. It both takes a bunch of time, and it does too much explanatory work for your opponent. Sometimes teams spend so much time sign-posting through "they say" that they do a better job explaining their opponent's position than their opponents did! I think the optimal way to sign-post is to practice "label by negating." Quite simply, this means you sign-post by negating your opponent's argument. For example, if you are reading a workforce shift DA and the aff says there are labor shortages now, then you can sign-post by saying: "NO WORKFORCE SHORTAGE NOW." I know the all caps is aggressive, but I am doing it for a reason: because label-by-negating is a shorter sign-post, you need to use your voice toolbox to make it clear you're doing sign-posting work to the judge. This means you need to change how you speak when you sign-post: either slowing down or getting louder (or sharper, more staccato -- short and sharp). One important note: flowing well is a prerequisite to good sign-posting. I like to "box" my labels on my flow: literally drawing a box around each section of the debate, and that cues me to switch to my "sign-post" voice for the judge.
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