Finding and Cutting Evidence
What is a card? What does it mean to cut cards?
This goes all the way back to when policy debate first started: debaters would actually use scissors to cut evidence from magazines and glue the lines they wanted onto note cards. Even though we have laptops and printers and don't have to get quite as arts-and-crafty with developing our evidence, the terminology stuck. The evidence that we read in round is in the form of "cards," and when we're "cutting cards," it means that we're highlighting and underlining what we want to read out loud in round from our evidence.
What does a card look like?
Example of a card
|
1. Tagline -- This is a summary of what your card says.
2. Source -- This is where the evidence is from. In round, you only have to read the last name of the author/the organization who wrote it and the date it was written. Normally you only say the year or you can just say the month and day if your evidence was written in the current year. (For example, "van der Woodsen 7" would mean it was from 2007, "Waldorf 2/1" would mean it was written the first of February of this year.) Write down the full credentials of your source as well. You usually don't need to read those credentials in your first speech, but you may need to explain why your authors are credible during cross-ex and when you're explaining why your evidence is better than your opponent's in later speeches. 3. Body -- This portion shows the entirety (or a large portion) of the article. The underlined portion is what's important. The highlighted potion is what you read out loud in round. |
✪ Tip: Note how there are bullet points directly underneath the tag of this card. These are the warrants of the card, or the big take-aways from the card. This is a really great way to make sure that you understand what your evidence is saying and this helps you refer back to your evidence and answer cross-ex questions specific to a card. It's much easier to read this than to re-read your entire card.
How do I cut a card?
1. Find evidence to cut. (I'll explain how to use Google in the next section.)
2. Copy and paste the section you are cutting from. Try to include the entire article, or if it's a long section of writing, copy and paste the beginning of the paragraph you are cutting from to the end of the last paragraph you are cutting from. If your evidence if referring to a specific example of an instance that requires context, you can include a paragraph or two before what you're cutting, even if you don't actually read it. For example, if I found this piece of evidence was on fire, and I wanted to start cutting from "It may cause extinction," the readers don't know what "it" is. Even if I state what "it" is in my tagline, "Our reliance on fried chicken may cause extinction," my opponents need to know that my evidence is specific to fried chicken causing extinction and not something else.
3. Underline the important bits. These are the parts that help you make your argument.
4. Condense the text. Usually, articles are in a multiple paragraph format. You don't want that. It'll be a lot easier to read if it's all combined, because it saves paper and reduces the amount of times you have to turn a page. So, go against what every one of your English teachers said, and make the article one huge paragraph.
5. Shrink the text that isn't underlined. This will help you focus on just the important stuff.
6. Highlight the most important things that you want to read in your speech. This will also help you save time reading. Here's an excerpt of the amazing evidence I mentioned earlier:
2. Copy and paste the section you are cutting from. Try to include the entire article, or if it's a long section of writing, copy and paste the beginning of the paragraph you are cutting from to the end of the last paragraph you are cutting from. If your evidence if referring to a specific example of an instance that requires context, you can include a paragraph or two before what you're cutting, even if you don't actually read it. For example, if I found this piece of evidence was on fire, and I wanted to start cutting from "It may cause extinction," the readers don't know what "it" is. Even if I state what "it" is in my tagline, "Our reliance on fried chicken may cause extinction," my opponents need to know that my evidence is specific to fried chicken causing extinction and not something else.
3. Underline the important bits. These are the parts that help you make your argument.
4. Condense the text. Usually, articles are in a multiple paragraph format. You don't want that. It'll be a lot easier to read if it's all combined, because it saves paper and reduces the amount of times you have to turn a page. So, go against what every one of your English teachers said, and make the article one huge paragraph.
5. Shrink the text that isn't underlined. This will help you focus on just the important stuff.
6. Highlight the most important things that you want to read in your speech. This will also help you save time reading. Here's an excerpt of the amazing evidence I mentioned earlier:
Notice how the highlighted portion still flows as a sentence. This reduces what I have to say from, "Our fried chicken obsession may come at a price. It may cause extinction of the human race," to "Fried chicken may cause extinction."
✪ Tip: If you are cutting an entire argument, such as a disadvantage, don't highlight until you have found and underlined all of the cards in that argument first, so you know about how much time you can spend on each point and adjust accordingly.
✪ Tip: If you are cutting an entire argument, such as a disadvantage, don't highlight until you have found and underlined all of the cards in that argument first, so you know about how much time you can spend on each point and adjust accordingly.
Where can I find evidence to cut?
You are most likely going to be dependent on Google for evidence. Yeah, I know. You were born in the 21st century, and you think you know how to Google. But typing in your homework question and praying that Yahoo!Answers has it doesn't work for debate research.
Let's learn about effective Googling:
1. Use quotation marks to specify a phrase you want to search. If I Google the words, fried chicken, Google will give me independent results for "fried" and independent results for "chicken." If I search "fried chicken," then I will only get results about fried chicken.
2. Perform time limited searches. You can do this by clicking on "search tools," then clicking on "any time." This allows you to get the most recent information about what you're searching.
3. Use the minus sign (-). This will exclude things you don't want results about. Let's say that I want to get information about parks and recreation, but every time I search, I only get things about the TV show. Instead, I can search the following: "parks and recreation" -tv
4. Use AROUND(#). This allows you to search for words that are so many words away from each other. So if you want to search up something about Obama and what he's going with the Cuban embargo, you can search: Obama AROUND(7) "Cuban embargo." This search will give you results with the words "Obama" and "Cuban embargo" around 7 words away from each other.
5. Type filetype:pdf along with what you are searching. This limits the search results to PDFs, which is helpful, because PDFs are typically more reliable sources. (And in case you can't copy and paste it, try using OCR to convert PDF text to word text.)
6. Use AND/OR. This allows you to have two search terms at the same time. AND ensures that both terms are included, whereas OR expands your search to include one or the other. So, I might search "ice cream" AND "weight loss," because I would love to drop some pounds but I'm not willing to give up ice cream. If I want to gain a lot of information about losing weight, I may search "weight loss" OR "lose weight" in order to maximize my search.
7. Use Google to search within a specific site using "site:___." Let's say that you find a really good site about environmental protection, but the search option they have on their site is not very easy to use. Instead, you can just use Google to search within that site for you. For example, I could search, site:epa.gov "renewable energy."
8. Change your search results to 100 per page. That way you go through 100 results before going to the 2nd page of Google which you've been trained to think as a last act of desperation.
9. Use command/control + click in order to open pages in another tab. This way you don't lose your place while searching on Google. And bonus, use control + F to type in what you searched in order to skim and determine whether that evidence will be useful or not.
9. Try using other Google tools, such as Google Scholar, Google Books, or Google News. Google Books can help you find sections of books for free that you can cut from instead of spending a ridiculous amount of money. Google News is super helpful for updates on politics, climate change, energy production, and much more.
Let's learn about effective Googling:
1. Use quotation marks to specify a phrase you want to search. If I Google the words, fried chicken, Google will give me independent results for "fried" and independent results for "chicken." If I search "fried chicken," then I will only get results about fried chicken.
2. Perform time limited searches. You can do this by clicking on "search tools," then clicking on "any time." This allows you to get the most recent information about what you're searching.
3. Use the minus sign (-). This will exclude things you don't want results about. Let's say that I want to get information about parks and recreation, but every time I search, I only get things about the TV show. Instead, I can search the following: "parks and recreation" -tv
4. Use AROUND(#). This allows you to search for words that are so many words away from each other. So if you want to search up something about Obama and what he's going with the Cuban embargo, you can search: Obama AROUND(7) "Cuban embargo." This search will give you results with the words "Obama" and "Cuban embargo" around 7 words away from each other.
5. Type filetype:pdf along with what you are searching. This limits the search results to PDFs, which is helpful, because PDFs are typically more reliable sources. (And in case you can't copy and paste it, try using OCR to convert PDF text to word text.)
6. Use AND/OR. This allows you to have two search terms at the same time. AND ensures that both terms are included, whereas OR expands your search to include one or the other. So, I might search "ice cream" AND "weight loss," because I would love to drop some pounds but I'm not willing to give up ice cream. If I want to gain a lot of information about losing weight, I may search "weight loss" OR "lose weight" in order to maximize my search.
7. Use Google to search within a specific site using "site:___." Let's say that you find a really good site about environmental protection, but the search option they have on their site is not very easy to use. Instead, you can just use Google to search within that site for you. For example, I could search, site:epa.gov "renewable energy."
8. Change your search results to 100 per page. That way you go through 100 results before going to the 2nd page of Google which you've been trained to think as a last act of desperation.
9. Use command/control + click in order to open pages in another tab. This way you don't lose your place while searching on Google. And bonus, use control + F to type in what you searched in order to skim and determine whether that evidence will be useful or not.
9. Try using other Google tools, such as Google Scholar, Google Books, or Google News. Google Books can help you find sections of books for free that you can cut from instead of spending a ridiculous amount of money. Google News is super helpful for updates on politics, climate change, energy production, and much more.
Verbatim
Verbatim is a program for paperless debating. This program is super helpful when it comes to cutting cards and I strongly urge you to get it. (It's free anyways, and everything is better when you don't have to buy it.) It'll help you format everything and better organize your evidence so you can see what you have and what you need.
