This Blog has now moved to idebate.org/worlddebating - all future posts will be made there!

23 December 1987

UC Dublin WUDC 1987

Winners: Glasgow (Sneader & Lally)
Finalists : Hart House Toronto (Oli & MacGregor), Swarthmore (Davis & Neureiter), ???

In 1987, University College, Dublin hosted the worlds in Ireland. It must have felt like the world showed up, too. The local newspaper reported that 220 teams were there. Even if that turned out to be 220 people, it was a sizeable invasion. Glasgow (Kevin Sneader & Austin Lally) were the World champion that year.

New Year’s Eve was a study in contrasts as the debaters who gathered in evening attire for a cold buffet in the Lord Mayor’s Hall found themselves ringing in the new year next door to a heavy metal rock concert, complete with “a bunch of guys in leather jackets and girls in red lipstick cracking gum.” The importance of understanding local cuxtoms was amply demonstrated to all who had not found out ahead of time that Dublin offers no public transportation on new Year’s Eve. The evening ended with what is variously described as a rainy two, three or four mile walk in formal wear.

This History of the World Debating Championships comes in 3 parts. From 1976 to 1990 it is taken almost word for word from the 1991 Toronto WUDC Tournament booklet. Who wrote it isn't known but it was provided by Randal Horobik. At the start of the section on Worlds in 1981 is an extract from an e-mail by Clark McGinn, Convenor of Debates, GU Union 1980 -81 and 1981 and Convenor of the First World Debating Competition, 1981. The history since 1991 has been compiled initially by Colm Flynn and edited by many contributors to Wikipedia. Unfortunately Wikipedia deleted the history due to copyright concerns so we are back here. Hopefully anyone who contributed to the Wiki article before it was deleted will be happy to see their work preserved here.