ALUMNI PUBLICATIONS

"The Art of Debate," Professor Warren Choate Shaw '10; Allyn David Bacon, 1922.

"The Art of Debate" by Warren Choate Shaw, formerly Professor of Public Speaking at Dartmouth, now of Knox College, Galesburg, Illinois, represents an enormous amount of work. The volume contains 461 pages and covers pretty much the entire field of argumentation and debate. Not only has the author gone into practically every phase of the subject, but his copious and apt illustrative material evinces a very wide acquaintance with what is best in forensic literature. It would seem that the author is at his best in treating many of the problems of persuasion while his conception of debate as an important part of our daily lives is timely and properly emphasized.

In the introduction which Professor Shaw himself writes, he obviously takes pains to make clear that he regards his best work is to be found in those divisions of the book devoted respectively to what he terms the Phase-System and Strategy. Herein we fail to agree with the author. The so-called Phase-System at best seems to us a very awkward and pedantic method of analysis almost sure to cause a revulsion in the mind and heart of the average student for all forms of debate.

With regard' to the chapter on Strategy, at least Professor Shaw is to be commended for his courage. So far as we know, no other writer on the subject has actually prescribed a detailed plan of procedure to enable the debater to go out and get the other fellow.

The Galesburg Republican-Ledger for Jan. 17, 1923, reviews Professor Shaw's book as follows:

"The aim of this book, as set forth in the preface, is to furnish students with a new and reliable working-text on the art of debate, complete in every detail, yet without a single page of padding.

"The book covers all that is commonly treated in a book on argumentation, and may be used with equal advantage in either argumentation or debate classes; for debate, as it is treated, is regarded merely as a highly developed and specialized form of argumentation.

"Both in its detailed treatment of various subjects and in its general plan and arrangement, the book is unique; and special attention in the preface is called to two chapters representing the author's most original contributions to the art of debate, one of these being entitled 'Surveying the Proof,' and the other being entitled 'Strategy.' In the first of these chapters, the author' reduces to a science the problem of analyzing questions for debate; and in the second, he treats fully one of the most important phases of debate, which all previous writers on- the subject have completely ignored."

Professor Fletcher Harper Swift '98, of the College of Education of the University of Minnesota, has in preparation a series of monographs on public school finance which will be published by the University of Minnesota. The first volume of this series, "Public School Finance in California and Colorado," has just been issued. The volumes yet to be issued are as follows : Volume II. "The East: School Finance in Massachusetts, New York and New Jersey"; Volume III. "The Middle West: School Finance in Minnesota, Illinois and South Dakota"; Volume IV. "The South: School Finance in Alabama and Arkansas."

Of interest is the comment which President Coffman of the University of Minnesota makes in his preface to the first volume regarding Swift. He writes:

"There was and is no one in this country, so far as I know, better qualified to make such a study and analysis than the author of this monograph. In 1911, he published the most scholarly study upon federal sources of revenue for public education that had ever been written. It is still accepted as the standard document in this field. For seven years, now, he has been studying systems of school finance. He himself has completed studies of school finance in Alaska, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Illinois, Massachusetts and Minnesota, and graduate students under his direction have made similar studies of New York, New Jersey, South Dakota and Vermont."

Swift's surveys of school finance in Arkansas and Oklahoma were made for the United States Bureau of Education. In 1922 he prepared a report on Federal aid for the United States Chamber of Commerce. Among his forthcoming publications are two government bulletins now in press: 1, "Federal Aid to Public Schools"; 2, "Financing Education in Arkansas."

Joseph H. Brewer '20 is the author of "In Lands Made Desolate," a poem which appears in Living Age for February 10th as a reprint from "Oxford Poetry, 1922,"

"Studies of the Vitamine of Cod Liver Oils," by Arthur D. Holmes '06 has been reprinted from the Journal of Metabolic Research for July, 1922.

The February issue of Outing contains an article by W. P. Fowler '21 entitled "All in the Day's Walk."

"The Use of Myths to Create Suspense in Extant Greek Tragedy," a dissertation presented to the Faculty of Princeton University in candidacy for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy by William W. Flint '12 has been published in a pamphlet of 87 pages.

Fred H. Harris 'll is the author of an article in the February issue of Winter SportsReview on "The Poetry of Winter Sports."

J. W. O'Neill '07 is the author of "Speech Content and Course Content in Public Speaking" which appears in the February, 1923, issue of the Quarterly Journal of Speech Education.

The February issue of the Granite Monthly contains an article by Henry Baily Stevens '12 entitled "New Hampshire's Educational Plant."

Thorndike Saville '14 is the author of "Water Power Situation in North Carolina," which appears in the North Carolina Geologicaland Economic Survey: water resources division, Bulletin No. 2.

"Taps," a poem by Harland F. Manchester '21, has been reprinted from the Boston Post of Nov. 11, 1922, in broadside form.