Articles tagged: repetition

On December 7th, 1941, Pearl Harbor was attacked by Japanese forces.

The next day, Franklin D. Roosevelt addressed the United States Congress with his memorable “a date which will live in infamy” speech.

This speech had two purposes:

  1. To urge Congress to formally declare war on Japan (which they did just minutes later), and
  2. To rally the American people to support the war effort.

In this speech analysis article, we focus on Roosevelt’s choice of words to see how they helped communicate his message. Then, from these choices, we extract 5 key speech writing lessons for you.

This is the latest in a series of speech critiques here on Six Minutes.

Continue Reading »

Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address is one of the most famous, most quoted, and most recited speeches of all time. It is also one of the shortest among its peers at just 10 sentences.

In this article, we examine five key lessons which you can learn from Lincoln’s speech and apply to your own speeches.

This is the latest in a series of speech critiques here on Six Minutes.

Continue Reading »

“I Have a Dream” by Martin Luther King Jr. is one of the most memorable speeches of all time.

It is worthy of lengthy study as we can all learn speechwriting skills from King’s historic masterpiece.

This article is the latest in a series of video speech critiques which help you analyze and learn from excellent speeches.

Continue Reading »

Is fifth grader Dalton Sherman the next Barack Obama?

Of course, it’s far too early to tell, but that’s how he refers to himself in an interview on the Ellen show, where my wife first saw this extraordinary young man who can teach us all something about inspirational speaking.

This article reviews the keynote address at the Dallas Independent School District (D.I.S.D.) Teachers’ Conference delivered by a 5th grade student: 10-year-old Dalton Sherman from Charles Rice Learning Center.

This article is the latest in a series of video speech critiques which help you analyze and learn from excellent speeches.

Continue Reading »

Does your audience need a dictionary to decipher your speeches?

Do you write your speeches with encyclopedic diction?

Do you draw your speechwriting inspiration from legal documents?

Technical writing, essays, financial reports, and legal writings all have their place — but none of them belong in your speechwriting.

Continue Reading »

The previous article in the Speech Preparation Series showed you how to edit your speech for focus, clarity, and concision.

However, your speech can be focused, clear, and concise and still lack vitality.

If your speech is void of rhetorical devices, it is like a painting void of color.

On all technical points, a black and white sketch might clearly be a woman smiling, or group of men having a meal, but without color, it’s not the Mona Lisa or The Last Supper.

With many examples, this article demonstrates how you can inject rhetorical devices into your speech during the editing process.

Continue Reading »

J.A. Gamache demonstrates how to complement strong writing with powerful body language in a speech titled “Being a Mr. G.” that took first place in the 2007 Region VI Toastmasters speech contest.

This video critique analyzes many noteworthy elements of the presentation, including:

  • a memorable speech opening and closing which feature the same prop;
  • the callback technique for repetitive humor;
  • emotionally charged writing; and
  • a series of wonderfully choreographed gestures.

Continue Reading »

Steve Jobs wrote and delivered the commencement speech “Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.” to the graduates of Stanford University on June 12, 2005.

The style and content are very different from his Apple product launch presentations, but no less worthy of study.

Noteworthy elements of this wonderful speech include:

  • strong opening;
  • simple classical structure;
  • the Rule of Three;
  • rich figures of speech; and
  • a recurring theme of birth/death/rebirth.

Continue Reading »

This article examines Al Gore’s presentation from TED in 2006. My aim is to evaluate the effectiveness of the presentation, not to express scientific or political opinion on the content of the message.

This was a fantastic presentation worthy of study. There is much to be learned from analyzing what Gore did well, and what he could have done better.

Continue Reading »

I first viewed Dick Hardt‘s Identity 2.0 presentation from OSCON 2005 over two years ago. It was unlike any presentation I had ever seen at the time. I noted that I had just been injected with information.

I recently returned to the presentation with a more critical view.

  • Was the presentation really that good?
  • Was it the style, the substance, or both?
  • More importantly, what can we, as presenters, learn from it?

Continue Reading »