The Barkley Forum awards banquet will not only honor the Emory debate community’s most accomplished citizens but will also serve as a kickoff for the 46th Barkley Forum for High Schools (BHFS), Feb. 2–4.

About 1,200 students, principals and teachers from roughly 200 schools as far away as Oregon and Washington will journey to Emory to participate in the tournament.

They will include defending champions Glenbrook North (Ill.) and College Preparatory (Calif.). Glenbrook North is one of the tournament’s most successful teams, having won titles in 1982–84, 1990 and 1992.

The three-day conference and competition will offer several tutorials on the art and practice of forensics, as well as the debates themselves, which will be organized into two formats: Lincoln-Douglas and Pelham.

Lincoln-Douglas debates—named for Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas, whose mid-19th century verbal thrust—and parry for an Illinois Senate seat still has relevance today—feature turn-taking constructive arguments, cross-examination and rebuttal.

Pelham debates carry the name of Thomas Glenn Pelham, Emory’s director of forensics from 1960 to 1972. They involve two teams of two debaters each debating both sides of a proposition (affirmatively and negatively) in a cross-examination format.

The BFHS is just one of the Barkley Forum’s upcoming outreach activities to high school debaters. The forum hosts several urban debate league (UDL) tournaments (including monthly middle school tournaments), several of those for the Atlanta UDL.

It is also teaming with Pace Academy, which is hosting a national UDL celebration in April. At the end of that tournament, it will host a two-day conference with different teams, teachers and administrators from UDLs all over the United States.