>> Hello once again class.
Now we're going to talk about language.
Now, if I -- if I haven't said this before I'll say it now, but I think I've said this before.
By the time you're done with your speech, you will be making decisions
about every word that goes into your speech.
And at this point we're going to talk about language.
So, how do you use language in your speech?
Okay, first thing we need to know is what words actually mean.
And the first meaning we look at is the denotative meaning.
The literal or dictionary meaning of a word or phrase.
So if you don't know what word means, you can look up in the dictionary.
That's the easy one.
That's the one that has a resource to figure out what's going on.
The connotative meaning is a little bit different.
The connotative meaning is the meaning suggested by associations
or emotions triggered by a word or a phrase.
So this is what comes to mind when you use a word,
not necessarily what the word means in the dictionary.
Now a lot of words have the same denotative and connotative meaning, but not all words do.
And as you're choosing your language you need
to know what the word is going to mean to your audience.
Not just denotatively, but connotatively.
So, what it's going to actually mean.
Okay, so when you're using language some guidelines you need to keep in mind.
And we'll go over these -- each one of these in more detail.
Use your language clearly and accurately, use language vividly, use language appropriately.
So when you're using language clearly and accurately --
we're talking about things like abstract words.
And abstract words refer to general concepts, qualities,
or attributes that are general, they're broad.
They're not very clearly defined.
So if I made the statement, the big vehicle started moving with a lot of noise and smoke.
What comes to mind?
I mean picture what that big vehicle is that's moving with a lot of noise and smoke.
I'm pretty ready willing to bet that this did not come to mind.
Now, if we think about it, is that a big vehicle?
Yeah, it sure is.
Does it start moving with a lot of noise and smoke?
Yeah, it sure does.
But if you're going to describe that image, that picture there,
you're probably better to refer to tangible objects.
The space shuttle Atlantis launched.
Even if you've never seen the space shuttle Atlantis launch,
you've see a space shuttle launch, or you understand it, or you've seen something on TV
or the news, or pictures, or something.
The space shuttle Atlantis launched is going to bring to mind this picture much more
than the large vehicle started moving with a lot of noise and smoke.
So, be as clear and specific as possible because remember you're trying to paint a picture
in your audience's mind, and you can't do that if you're just using really broad terms.
Okay. So concrete words, these are things that are very clearly defined.
So if I'm going to -- if I say I'm going to do a speech about a person and I say,
oh it's someone who engages in physical activity.
This is anyone who's not actually dead at the time.
Because everyone engages in physical activity.
No, no, no, we need to narrow it down more.
So someone who engages in sports.
Okay, that narrows it down from, you know, 7 billion or however many people are on the planet
down to, you know, hundreds of millions.
Maybe even in the billions.
Golf. Now I'm down into probably tens of millions.
Professional golf.
Now into tens of thousands.
Tiger Woods.
Okay, now I know what exactly I'm talking about.
It's very different to say this speech is about someone who engages in physical activity
versus this speech is about Tiger Woods.
Now I know clearly what the speech is about.
So be as concrete as possible.
Paint that image, paint the picture in your audiences mind as clearly as you can.
Okay, use your language vividly.
So create an image.
So, you want to create a mental image of objects, actions, or ideas.
So if I said, he dove for the ball.
That's a pretty descriptive statement.
Right? He dove for the ball.
That describes this.
And now you know why I'm not an art teacher,
because that's about as good as I get with, you know, art.
Okay. So, he dove for the ball describes that.
If I wanted to do a little bit better job -- because with this, let's be honest,
we don't even know what kind of ball that is.
It's probably based on his head size.
Maybe a softball.
It's not a baseball.
It's too big.
It's not a soccer ball.
It's too small.
So, yeah, he dove for the ball -- not very descriptive.
Now if I said, it was the final point
of the breast cancer awareness beach volleyball tournament.
Wearing his bright pink hat and with his teammates looking on in dread,
he fully extended himself for the ball as it plummeted towards the sand.
His dive saved the point and won the match.
That describes this.
Now, he dove for the ball?
I guess if I had that picture up and said, he dove for the ball.
That could be descriptive.
But if I don't have that picture up there -- if it's just a blank screen,
he dove for the ball does not bring that picture up.
I want to describe it as well as I can.
Okay. So use your language vividly.
And we'll see an example here.
This is Ronald Reagan.
Now he's going to describe a scene and he's describing D Day.
Now, he's got a little bit of an advantage because he's standing
on the location that he is going to describe.
But as you're watching this, listen for how he does that, how he sets the scene,
how he puts us there in -- really literally in the middle of the action here.
So let's take a listen.
>> We stand, on a lonely windswept point on the northern shore of France,
the [inaudible] 40 years ago, at this moment,
the air was dense with smoke and the cries of men.
[Inaudible].
At dawn, on the morning of the 6th of June 1944, 225 Rangers jumped off British landing crafts
and ran to the bottom of these cliffs.
Their mission was one of the most difficult [inaudible] invasion.
And taken out the enemy guns.
The allies had been told that some of the mightiest of these guns were here
and they would be trained on the beaches to stop the allied advance.
Rangers looked up and saw the enemy soldiers on the edge of the cliffs shooting
down [inaudible] and throwing grenades.
The American Rangers began the climb.
[Inaudible].
One Ranger fell, another would take his place.
[inaudible] began his climb again.
They climbed, shot back and held their [inaudible].
Soon, one by one Rangers pulled themselves over the top, seizing the firm land at the top
of these cliffs, they began to seize back.
[Inaudible] of Europe.
225 came here.
After two days of fighting, only 19 still bear arms.
>> So if we think about the language that he uses, things like sheer and desolate cliffs.
Not just tough cliffs or tall cliffs, but sheer and desolate.
So that's what we're talking about with creating imagery there.
Okay, now we get into different types of language.
We get into things like similes and metaphors.
So similes.
Similes are a comparison.
I will say a simile is an approximation.
It is introduced with like or as.
Now the approximation, English teachers might argue with you
about that so don't quote me on it.
But it helps me to kind of understand the difference between a simile and a metaphor.
So, introduce with like or as.
So our example here.
Air pollution is eating away at the monuments in Washington D.C.
like a giant Alka Seltzer tablet.
So with this I could almost get an image in my mind of the Washington Monument
and a big glass of water bubbling away.
Even if you've never actually taken an Alka Seltzer tablet,
you probably have seen one or can figure it out.
Metaphors are a little bit different.
It's a comparison.
It's more an equation in principle than more direct, and it's not introduced with like or as.
So America's cities are the windows through which the world looks at American society.
So, I'm saying some of the attributes of cities and windows are similar.
So similes and metaphors, you can use them because by using
that it can almost be a shortcut to creating that image in your audiences mind.
Okay. So other things that we can do?
When we saw in the clip of Reagan he was doing this with rhythm.
Patterns of sound created by your choice and/or arrangement of words.
For example here from Winston Churchill.
As you're listening to it, listen to the words that he uses in the beginning of the section
versus towards the end, and kind of how they sound and the scheme of --
almost the poetry of the words that he uses.
>> We cannot tell what the course if this [inaudible] war will be.
And [inaudible].
We know it will be hard.
We expect it will be long.
We cannot [inaudible].
>> So when he starts off with this, he starts -- the words that he's using,
we cannot tell when this fell war will end.
It's almost lyrical.
It's almost musical.
But then when he gets to the end it's, every trace
and stain must be expunged and purged and blasted.
It's -- the language itself and the word choice kind of creates
that connotative meaning beyond just the denotative meanings of the words.
Okay. Other ways to use your language.
We've got parallelism.
A similar arrangement of a pair or series of related words, phrases, or sentences.
Rich and poor, intelligent and ignorant, wise and foolish, virtuous and vicious,
man and woman, is ever the same, each soul must depend wholly on itself.
So with this, we can see that parallelism is in those coupling of words.
Rich and poor, intelligent and ignorant.
And what we're doing with this is not only creating that parallelism,
but we're also tying the terms together.
And because what we're really saying is rich, intelligent, wise, virtuous man,
and unfortunately poor, ignorant, foolish, vicious, women.
Now, this was written over 100 years ago.
Times were different.
I would say if you're going to write this today just get rid of man and woman with this.
You don't really need it.
So it would be rich, intelligent, wise, virtuous,
and then poor, ignorant, foolish, vicious.
Because really what we're talking about is each soul must depend wholly on itself.
So be aware of that, but the parallelism allows the audience to kind
of go beyond the individual meanings of the words.
Repetition.
Reiterating the same word set of words at the beginning
or end of successive clauses or sentences.
If not now, when?
If not us, who?
If not together, how?
So by the use of repetition it allows the audience to focus
on a smaller part of the section.
So we're really not focusing on the entire thing.
Our brain is focusing on when, now, who, us, how, together.
Because that's the really important part of it.
Alliteration.
Repeating the initial consonant and closer adjoining words.
Our colleges, our community, and our country should challenge hatred wherever we find it.
By using alliteration, by using that hard c sound -- colleges, community, and country --
by putting those together and tying those three things together much more
than just the words mean.
Its they sound similar.
They're -- at least they start similarly.
So I'm creating a connection between them.
Antithesis.
Juxtaposition of contrasting ideas usually in parallel structure.
Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.
This is one of those sentences that if you put this together in an English paper
and send it off to your English teacher, they will probably tell you
to rephrase it because it's a little awkward.
But, in a speech it can work because it forces the audience to actually think
about what's being said, and it's a pretty famous line,
from a pretty famous speech, from a pretty famous guy.
Right? It's JFK's inaugural address.
So I think it works better if you can use that Massachusetts -- ask not what your country --
but we'll get into that next chapter.
Okay, using your language appropriately.
And I already kind of touched on it a little bit when we did the vicious women line.
But it needs to be appropriate for the occasion, the audience, the topic, and the speaker.
So, if it's more formal or less formal choose to go with the more formal in general.
Okay, so when you're using language appropriately you need
to use inclusive language, and this is language that does not stereotype or demean on the basis
of gender, race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, et cetera.
You want to avoid the generic "he".
Avoid use of "man" when referring to both men and women.
Don't stereotype.
Stereotype based on job, social roles, and gender.
Use names groups use to identify themselves.
So let's look at some examples.
It's inappropriate to say, whenever a surgeon walks
into the operating room he risks being sued for malpractice.
Couple of problems with this.
First of all, you're assuming that all surgeons are men.
People in the audience might call you out on that.
A more appropriate way, whenever a surgeon walks into the operating room she
or he risks being sued for malpractice.
I don't like this.
And I don't like this because it draws the attention away
from what I'm really talking about, which is being sued for malpractice into she or he.
Because whenever I see she or he I always read that as, whenever a surgeon walks
into the operating room she or he -- wink wink -- but I know and you know it means he,
but I'm being politically correct -- risks being sued for malpractice.
You're dropping that big thing in the middle of your sentence and you don't want to do that.
I would say a better way to do it would be, whenever surgeons walk
into the operating room they risk being sued for malpractice.
What I've done there is I've removed the gender,
because the gender doesn't matter to what I'm talking about.
I'm talking about surgeons sued for malpractice.
Now, in this case it was easy to do.
I just changed surgeons to plural and then changed the pronoun to they.
So it works.
So sometimes you might have to rearrange it a little bit,
but I think this is a much more effective sentence and it does what I need it to do.
It's inappropriate to say, if a large comet struck the earth it could destroy all mankind.
You know, some women might be like, hey!
More appropriate, if a large comet struck the earth it could destroy all human life.
I'm going to say that's still being a little too specific.
How about, if a large comet struck the earth it could destroy all life.
Because, you know, the pets and the plants would also kind of have a bad day as well.
Don't stereotype.
Being a small businessman in the current economic climate is not easy.
So what? Owning a business means you're a man?
More appropriate, being a small business person in the current economic climate is not easy.
And you all see what I'm doing there.
Person is politically correct, but again it drops that big chunk
of a sentence in the middle of my sentence.
So, I would say try something like this.
Owning a small business in the current economic climate is not easy.
Or owning and operating a small business.
Something like that.
Again, gender doesn't matter to what I'm talking about so get rid of it.
Use group self-identifiers.
The Paralympics show what handicap people can accomplish in the athletic arena.
And the problematic word there is handicapped.
It has negative connotations.
So more appropriate might be, the Paralympics show what people
with disabilities can accomplish in the athletic arena.
Or you could say, the Paralympics show what the differently abled can accomplish
in the athletic arena.
The point here is don't just throw a word in there that you're comfortable
with if you're not part of that group.
What does the group use to identify themselves?
So, if they use people with disabilities,
if they use differently abled, that's what you want to use.
Okay, next time we'll work on delivery.
And delivery is closely related to language.
The language you choose leads to the delivery that you do,
and the delivery will lead to language.
So stay tuned for next time and we'll see you next week.
Thanks. Bye.