Speeches and Video from Public Speaking Rules!

Speeches

NEW: The all-purpose commencement address

Get excited with "I have a dream", then carry your excitement... And Then Some! Learn about myths, speech speed, and simply speaking well. Fear and/or phobia of public speaking? We have you covered. Watch the videos, learn, have fun, and find your favorite!

Click the links below for videos and text:

Video:

> Speech Speed vs. Thought Speed

> Stand up, Speak well

> Ten Myths of Public Speaking

> The Curse of Knowledge

> Fears and Phobias of Public Speaking

> And Then Some Speech

> Martin Luther King Jr. - I have a dream

Text:

> NEW: The all-purpose commencement address

> And Then Some Speech

> I have a dream speech editorial

	Speech Speed vs. Thought Speed by Richard L. Weaver II, PhD Video info: It doesn't come as a surprise that you think faster than you speak. Everyone does. Research has demonstrated that most people think at about 600 words per minute or greater but speak at only about 150 to 200 words per minute. This fact, however, has tremendous influence on both the effectiveness of speakers and the ability of listeners. When listeners’ thoughts run well beyond the words heard, it could be that all the time and preparation that speakers put into their speeches would fall of deaf ears.

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	Stand up, Speak well by Richard L. Weaver II, PhD Video info: When I took my first speech class, it was an actress in my class who told me how to overcome my nervousness. She said, don't think of yourself as someone giving a speech. Instead, think of yourself as an actor delivering the speech. What this does is to allow us to step outside of ourselves and to be someone else — what actors must do. When you're someone else, you are no longer nervous, since its no longer you. So, the first thing to do is think of yourself as an actor on the stage.

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	Ten Myths of Public Speaking by Richard L. Weaver II, PhD Video info: Having taught public speaking for close to thirty years, I have had the opportunity to hear and debunk most of the myths surrounding the subject. When you hear weak or bad public speeches, often belief in these myths is directly responsible. It isn't the myths themselves that present the problem, it is the result of belief in them — the speeches themselves — that is problematic.

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	The Curse of Knowledge by Richard L. Weaver II, PhD Video info: The "curse of knowledge" has several important implications for public speakers. First, as you plan and prepare you speech, put yourself in your listeners' position. Second, ask yourself, "Knowing what my listeners know, how much research do I need to support the points of my speech?" Third, what types of evidence are likely to most effective? Understanding the "curse of knowledge" will help you answer questions, guide your research, turning your next speech... into a GREAT public speech!

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	Fears and Phobias of Public Speaking by Richard L. Weaver II, PhD Video info: How do you overcome the fear of public speaking? You start with learning the basic fundamentals of giving a GREAT speech. Learn the basics so you are prepared, in turn, building a foundation of confidence you need for public speaking. Before giving a speech, a little anxiety is normal; however, everyone is different and there is no one cure-all to conquer true fears and phobias. Get the fundamentals down and then discover what your true fear is.

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	And Then Some Speech Video by Richard L. Weaver II, PhD Video info: The "And Then Some" philosophy is a simple "life enhancement tool" that when applied personally can help focus, motivate, and enrich your life. No matter what your beliefs, no matter at what stage of life you are, and no matter where you are in this world, with the confidence of "And Then Some" you no longer need to accept the "status quo." This philosophy will reduce your apprehension of the "unknown," and it will motivate you to learn, experience, develop, and grow with the wonderful, natural side effect of helping others.

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The all-purpose commencement address

by Richard L. Weaver, PhD

Is it odd or simply ironic that after all the misery this university has foisted on you up to this point, that the university would add one more miserable hurdle — the commencement-day address — a custom dating back to the 12th century — that you must jump for you to gain closure on your years and years of misery? I think it may be oddly ironic. It was Garry Trudeau who said, “Commencement speeches were invented largely in the belief that outgoing college students should never be released into the world until they have been properly sedated.”

Anyone who graduated from college close to fifty years ago has to have some words of advice for those graduating today, and I am no exception. It’s not really, “do as I say, not as I did,” as much as, “things I wish I had known when I was your age.” When I give my talk on “Becoming a writer” to fourth and fifth graders, one of the questions I get is, “Did you want to become a writer when you were our age?” That’s a terrific question, and the answer is, “No, but I didn’t have someone come to my class when I was your age and talk about becoming a writer, either! I mean, it could have changed my life much earlier!” In much the same way, I wish I had had a commencement speaker willing to level with me!

Commencement addresses need to encourage graduates to make a commitment to excellence, develop strong character, and serve their community and the world. These encouragements are what is known as boilerplate expectations for such speeches, and, to me, these are fine expectations, but if you haven’t developed these traits along the way during your formal education, I really don’t see a whole lot of hope for you in starting now, so such advice, to me, doesn’t make a whole lot of sense at this point in your life!

Another, what I would call “pedestrian,” call to arms is to work hard, because you never know what’s coming next, but with hard work you will be prepared for it. Well, I know there are many different routes to getting where you are seated today, but I would suspect that for most of you, hard work — at least at some points — got you this far. If you haven’t developed a sufficient work ethic by this point in your life, I doubt you’ll be discovering it graduation!

There are several other wrong pieces of advice, too. For example, the idea that this is the best, happiest, or greatest day of your life! Oh, come on, this is graduation day, nothing more. I hope it’s not the best, happiest, or greatest day of your life because it means your life is all downhill from here. When you look back on your life, it’s unlikely you will call it that because you’ve got weddings, anniversaries, the birth of your first child, and employment and promotions, among other things, to celebrate and label. Just wait, there is far more and far better to come!

A final piece of wrong advice is that your diploma is your ticket to opportunity. A diploma is nothing more than a piece of paper; it’s you who creates opportunities for yourself. There are many people out there who collected their ticket but never took the ride.. If you don’t expect anything as a result of your graduation, you will soon come to the realization that what you get in life will be what you earn, what you discover, and what you learn to appreciate. A life is not created by a diploma — a life is created by what you are willing to put into it. You are a better gauge of your potential for success than a mere piece of paper. Make a paper airplane from your diploma, send it skyward with a toss, follow that plane with your hopes and dreams, and a full life will be lost.

Okay, if all this is wrong advice, what advice is important and proper? The first piece of advice is an important one. Allow your college experience to be a launching pad into the realm of information, knowledge, learning, and understanding. When you stay informed, seek knowledge, learn from everything with which you have contact, and try to understand the world, you become the educated elite in our society and those upon whom our democracy depends for informed decisions, right thinking, and proper judgment. What you know now is nothing compared with what there is to know! Make a commitment right here, right now: never stop learning, growing, and developing.

My second piece of advice directly follows this first piece. Stop being so arrogant, possessive, and self-satisfied with what you know right now. The fact is that a large percentage of what you are certain of right now, is totally wrong and deluded. The only way to find this out is what I said previously: stay informed, seek knowledge, learn from everything with which you have contact, and try to understand the world. Seek answers. Question everything. Test your knowledge. Read things that are controversial and that are contrary to your beliefs, and listen to those who have something to say. Be skeptical, not cynical. You must exercise control over how and what you think, and choose wisely how you construct meaning from your experiences.

My third piece of advice directly follows from the first two pieces. Remain alert and aware, open and sensitive, flexible and responsive. There is nothing wrong with charting a specific course for achieving success, and I’m sure many of you know exactly what you plan to do. The problem comes when following such a plan blinds you to everything else that goes on in your life. Often, success doesn’t come from following your charted course; it comes from being alert and aware, open and sensitive, flexible and responsive — that is, ready to take a risk, grab a chance, capitalize on an opportunity, or try something off the beaten track. You never know what telling moment, inspiring spark, or arousing insight may change your life.

My final piece of advice is simple: be resilient. When my neighbor said she was given two-week’s notice because her firm eliminated her position, she said, “Now, maybe I can do something I really want to do.” That’s resilience. Ever since grade school you were told that if you worked hard, did well in school, and graduated from college, the world would be yours. The promise was a comfortable future, and what I’m here to tell you is — not that the promise is false, but there is no silver platter. There will be many failures and disappointments, and the more resilient you are, the easier it is to overcome losses, defeats, and catastrophes.

There is one thing for absolute certain about graduation, and this could be cause for celebration alone! When you leave here today, you will have something that no one else in the world has. There are going to be thousands of people out there with your same degree. There will be hundreds, perhaps thousands, too, doing what you will be doing for a living. After all, McDonalds and WalMart are two of the biggest employers in the world! I’m kidding. What will you have that no other person has? You will be the only person in the world who has complete control of your life! Not just now, not just tomorrow or the next day, but for your entire life. Whether it’s at a desk, on a bus or train, in a car, or at the computer, you are in charge, and what you do or don’t do will be the factor that makes all the difference in your life!

By controlling your own life, you are the one who chooses to continue to learn, step away from your arrogance, remain flexible and responsive, and be resilient. In these ways you will be making a commitment to excellence, developing strong character, and serving your community. Graduation is a great time to begin taking charge of your life.

It's public speaking And Then Some! Visit our website and blog so you can give more, get more, want more from life!

And Then Some Essays every week on our And Then Some Works blog. Covering a wide variety of subjects that entertain, motivate, and inspire including public speaking! Get your And Then Some every THURSDAY...

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And Then Some
Give more, Get more, Want more from life!

by Richard L. Weaver, PhD

The “And Then Some” philosophy is a simple “life enhancement tool” that when applied personally can help focus, motivate, and enrich your life. No matter what your beliefs, no matter at what stage of life you are, and no matter where you are in this world, with the confidence of “And Then Some” you no longer need to accept the “status quo.” This philosophy will reduce your apprehension of the “unknown,” and it will motivate you to learn, experience, develop, and grow with the wonderful, natural side effect of helping others.

As you see the positive results from the “And Then Some” life, it generates an excited energy that inspires you to “dive in,” attack problems, find solutions, and deal with the “unknown.” This “life enhancement tool” is one that encourages you to take responsibility for your actions, your personal world, and the world around you. Through the “And Then Some” philosophy you will discover infinite possibilities!

With an “And Then Some” attitude you can teach yourself a new approach, a new outlook, and a new zest for life. It will help you look at life differently than you previously did. As you apply “And Then Some” you will notice how even the smallest things — opening a door for someone, offering a smile, or saying “Hello” to a stranger — are richer, truer, and more satisfying everyday.

The best way to put the “And Then Some” philosophy into practice at once is to learn for yourself what “And Then Some” means to you. Going beyond what is expected is just scratching the surface. Here’s the formula: “And Then Some” knowledge - PLUS - “And Then Some” experience - PLUS - “And Then Some” confidence - EQUALS - “And Then Some” REWARDS!

The single place where “And Then Some” can make a major difference throughout your life, can be found in this challenge: “Become a sponge for knowledge.” You will be amazed by the amount of new information, new avenues, new paths, new knowledge that will inspire you, motivate you, and take you to places you have never thought possible. The “And Then Some” approach never allows any opportunity, any experience, or any encounter to be an educational vacuum.

When your mind is set on fire you will always find ways to provide more fuel!

It is your choice to either avail or deny yourself the opportunity of “And Then Some.” But why would you choose to deny it? The philosophy is easy to put into practice. The more you feed “And Then Some,” the more it will continue to enrich your life with each step forward. Discovering this, the world becomes your classroom, and every stimulus in the world becomes a prompt, an incentive, an impulse to stretch your mind by defining and redefining what “And Then Some” means to you. The more you see the positive influences in your life through “And Then Some” the more excited you become and the more “And Then Some” you will want.

“And Then Some” can help turn negative things into learning situations. Known and previously unknown opportunities will emerge helping you enhance your skills, whatever they are. Will every idea work? Will every situation be perfect? Of course not. But more often than not, you’ll realize over and over the benefits and rewards of the “And Then Some” philosophy. Though difficult at times, you never know what strategy will inspire, what avenue will motivate, what path will influence, what idea will energize, or where true inspiration lies. You give more with the “And Then Some” philosophy, but you get so much more in return. Do not deny yourself “And Then Some!”

Applying “And Then Some” to your personal life means accepting your need to destroy the mind set — the prison — into which you lock yourself. All of your previous behaviors — your habits and routines — bind you, keep you secure, and hold you back. The obvious cliché is “Don’t upset the apple cart,” but if you don’t upset the cart, the apples are going to rot anyway, and you’ll end up with a life of cleaning up the messes that rotten apples leave behind.

What is the most normal response when your teachers, family, friends, relationship partners hold you back or ignore or even flat out reject your efforts to shed your old skin and adopt a new philosophy? They try to pull you back in, back to the safe, secure, old you. Don’t let them. Instead, press on and realize your potential! Do not deny yourself “And Then Some!”

We all want the best out of life. We all want to be healthy and happy and to have things that can enrich our life experience. Oliver Wendell Holmes said: “a mind stretched by a new idea never returns to its original form,” but to truly stretch means we must leave our current comfort zone and reject the “status quo.” No matter what our beliefs, at what stage of life we are, or where we are in this world, the “And Then Some” philosophy—this “life enhancement tool” — can enrich our life through learning, developing, growing, and, in addition, pushing, shoving, and even kicking us into doing a little bit more. With “And Then Some” our lives will awaken to the joy of real living, the joy of knowing we’ve contributed, the joy of being truly informed, the joy of knowing we have really come to know ourselves — the joy of what “And Then Some” is all about.

It’s up to us and us alone! Socrates said, “The unexamined life is not worth living.” We have to want to discover, explore, find out, and challenge our selves and our lives. We have to confront who we are and what we want to become. “And Then Some” is worth it. It is worth the commitment, worth the time, and worth the effort!

Here’s the formula again: And Then Some” knowledge - PLUS - “And Then Some” experience - PLUS - “And Then Some” confidence - EQUALS - “And Then Some” REWARDS!

Martin Luther King, Jr. "I have a dream" speech video

Martin Luther King’s ‘I Have a Dream’ speech
— The greatest and most notable speech in history
by Richard L. Weaver, PhD

Martin Luther King’s “I Have A Dream” speech, delivered August 28, 1963, was a defining moment of the American Civil Rights Movement. Given from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to over two-hundred thousand civil rights supporters, the speech lasted only sixteen minutes. According to U.S. Congressman, John Lewis, who also spoke that day as the President of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, “"Dr. King had the power, the ability and the capacity to transform those steps on the Lincoln Memorial into a modern day pulpit. By speaking the way he did, he educated, he inspired, he informed not just the people there, but people throughout America and unborn generations.”

There was more taking place when King gave his speech than would at first be apparent. To the untrained eye, his speech was moving, encouraging, even galvanizing. To the trained eye, however, it was truly a model speech and, indeed, one of the greatest and most notable speeches in history. It has been ranked the top American speech of the 20th century by a 1999 poll of scholars of public address.

The obvious question is, “Why is it a model speech?”

For 22 years I delivered a lecture entitled, “Persuasion: The Unity of Logos, Pathos, and Ethos,” to close to 80,000 undergraduates. In this lecture I examined the speech. This essay is a condensation of that lecture, and I have divided it into the three parts: logos, pathos, and ethos.

Logos means logic, and as a persuasive strategy, speakers use a clearly stated main purpose, a well-defined thought pattern, and effective major arguments supported by evidence. In his “I Have a Dream” speech, King used mostly his own personal experience and observations to support his major arguments. His purpose statement is, “Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God’s children.”

Perhaps the most important aspect of King’s logic was how he organized his ideas. He followed Monroe’s motivated sequence. It is a pattern that works because it follows the normal process of human reasoning. I told students that if I had to pick out one piece of information that I considered most important — from all of my 15 lectures — it would be this five-step sequence. If you ever have to give a problem-solving persuasive speech, I highly recommend it. It is so effective and powerful, most advertisements you see on television follow it precisely.

The five steps of the Monroe motivated sequence are attention, need, satisfaction, visualization and action.
In the attention step speakers call attention to the situation. King, speaking from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, calls attention to Lincoln’s signing of the Emancipation Proclamation, the situation of the Negro today (“One hundred years later, the Negro still is not free.”), and the fact that the words of the Constitution and Declaration of Independence granting all people the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness have not been fulfilled.

For the need step, speakers describe the difficulty, trouble, distress, crisis, emergency, or urgency. King says, “Instead of honoring this sacred obligation [what the Constitution and Declaration of Independence promise], America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check that has come back marked ‘insufficient funds.’” And why have they come to Washington, D.C.? — to “remind America of the fierce urgency of now.”

In the satisfaction step, speakers tell listeners how to satisfy the need they establish. King says, “We must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead.” To march ahead, he said, “We can never be satisfied.” Then he tells listeners to go back home knowing their situation can and will be changed.

For visualization, speakers offer listeners a vision of what life can be once their solution (offered in the satisfaction step) is adopted. This is where King offers listeners his dream: “I have a dream” offered along with five different descriptions of what life can and will be like in Georgia, Mississippi, Alabama, in communities, and around the world.

The final stage is the action step when speakers offer listeners a specific course of action to follow. King’s action step occurs when he asks his audience to “Let freedom ring,” and he uses the phrase at the end of the speech focusing on eight states symbolizing the whole nation.

Pathos means emotion, and King depends on his use of language to draw emotion from his listeners. Figures of speech predominate. Antithesis, or the setting of one clause or other member of a sentence against another to which it is opposed, is heavily used. “It came as a joyous daybreak to end their long night of captivity,” is the first of many examples of antithesis used in the speech.

King also uses many other figures of speech. Simile is the comparison of two unlike things, connected with the words “like” or “as” such as “justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.” Metaphor is a compressed simile (the “like” or “as” is eliminated) and they are abundant: “manacles of segregation,” “symphony of brotherhood.” Allusions, or references to literary, historical, and biblical events, occur often. “Five score years ago” refers to the Gettysburg Address, and there are biblical allusions to Psalm 30:5, Amos 5:24, and Isaiah 40:4. In addition, King uses personification, hyperbole, contrast, colloquialisms, repetition, refrain (anaphora), and parallelism.

Ethos means the character of the speaker in the eyes of the audience. King was born into a well-educated, successful family, graduated from Morehouse College, and, as the outstanding member of his senior class, from Crozer Theological Seminary. He received his Ph.D. in philosophy in 1955, and served as minister of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church from 1955 to 1968. His Nobel Peace Prize was received one year after this speech was given.

The “I Have a Dream” speech served as a precursor to the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. King was Time’s “Man of the Year” for 1963. As a speech, it was the greatest and most notable in history and served as a model for the way it demonstrated the unity of logos, pathos, and ethos.

For an online biography of Martin Luther King Jr., see: nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/1964/king-bio.html

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Public Speaking Rules!