Rockland District News
Thursday March 27, 2014
Students' MacBeth Based Debate
By Brady Whitteker - Trudell
March
of 2014, English students in Rockland District High School had held three
debates, all of which regarded either the play MacBeth or the incredibly famous
Playwright William Shakespeare. The debates were held in room 228 of Rockland
District High School. The debates were held on the 20th, 21st
and 24th of March. The participants were students of Paul Murray’s
grade 11 University level English class. The second debate was held on March 21st,
2014, from 1:15 pm until 2:30 pm.
The
topic of the second debate was “The Witches set MacBeth up.” Two teams of three
were debating whether the witches in MacBeth had used the title character in
some sort of a ploy, and the winning team was decided by the panel consisting
of three judges. The affirmative team that was arguing that the witches had set
MacBeth up included Amy, Christina, and James. The Negative team that was
arguing that MacBeth was not set up by the witches included Matt, Thomas, and
Brennen. The judges included Sara, Austin, and Ryan. The debate’s audience
consisted of the rest of the class. The two teams debated their positions by
using facts and evidence from the play, as well as historical evidence.
Each
of the two teams had prepared for the debate by conducting thorough research in
order to strongly argue their point as well as rebut any points that the
opposing team made. The points made by the affirmative team included the way
witches were viewed during Shakespeare’s time as well as the fact that MacBeth
would have done none of the things that he did had the witches not have
revealed that he will be king. The points made by the negative team included
the fact that MacBeth has free will as well as the fact that even after hearing
the witches’ prophecy, MacBeth was not going to kill anybody until Lady MacBeth
had called his masculinity and courage into question. The two teams had taking
the debate seriously while trying to make the debate entertaining. An example
of this would be when Christina had pulled three stick figures with the faces
of the opposing team and a handful of candle-shaped lights out of a briefcase
to demonstrate a point that she was making, an action to which Matt, one of the
opposing debaters, had responded with the question “What grade are we in?”
After the debate, the judges had decided that the negative team had been the
victors, stating that they had both the stronger and sounder argument, but the
affirmative team had still debated quite fairly.
