Denzel Washington Make A Difference Speech

In order to deliver a successful speech, there are countless qualities that must be present to reach both the emotional and logical sense within a crowd. Through the use of rhetorical strategies and by remaining credible, a speaker or an author can connect with their audience; getting them involved with their writing. In May of 2011, a man by the name of Denzel Washington used multiple rhetorical strategies to deliver a graduation speech at the University of Pennsylvania. While revealing all of the difficult times that he had gone through while in college and discovering what career he wanted to pursue, he inspired millions of people, leaving a profound effect upon the world. Now, with millions of fans, Washington is a famous actor that has starred in numerous movies such as Courage Under Fire, Crimson Tide, and Malcolm X. Washington, along with the authors: Aristotle, Peter Elbow, and Donald Murray, and many others, have made a big difference in the world, simply by using rhetorical strategies.

Washington’s farewell to being a politician as he retired; warned against political ties with other countries, the forming of political parties, importance of religion and morality, and to play a good role in conflicts worldwide

The tone is encouraging because it focuses on being optimistic and supportive for their future, which is the main goal for all students to be aware and to “never give in to despair” (Mccaskill). The speech conveys a purpose and a message for students to remember and to always have this engraved in their minds and hearts. Furthermore, he wants the audience to be aware of hardship and running this journey as future doctors, lawyers, teachers, or any professional career that will be difficult, but believing yourself is the key essential in life to follow that

To begin, Washington is standing upon the stage to provide uplifting words as these students move on to greater things. He uses words such as “dream”, “aspire” and “success” (Washington), to provide motivation for them to become more improved and promising individuals. These words are all encouraging and positive for the purpose of influencing the graduates to pursue a fruitful life and to continue dreaming of more prosperity and goodness. While he is telling his

One of the finest commencement speeches was given by David Foster Wallace at Kenyon College. Wallace’s speech can be viewed as enlightening to those who are often blindly single-minded. It forces the audience to take a look at the way they approach everyday situations, rather than being self-centered, consider others before yourself. However, many overlook Wallace’s impeccable rhetorical maneuvers, focusing on the constant clichés and fictional anecdotes used. What people don’t realize is these clichés and fictional anecdotes are what make Wallace’s speech effective and reinforce the basic principles we were taught as a child, to share and think of others before ourselves. Overlooking Wallace’s flawless technique is doing a disservice to

I see students as the next generations’ heroes in so many fields. In my vision, I have to inspire students and prepare them with confidence, knowledge, experience and skills. Which means I encourage, communicate, guide, teach, and assess students in order to enrich their infrastructures.

Every student is different, from how they learn to how much effort do they put in when studying. But with the right teacher guiding them to success, nothing is impossible. So, how do we motivate the future generation to succeed in school? The Perils and Promise of Praise, by Carole S. Dweck. The author focus on how to motivate students to succeed in school. From how you talk to them, motivate them to learn and rewarding them.

Washington starts off his speech with pathos. Pathos is appealing to the emotional side of the audience and trying to get an emotional response from them. Washington begins his speech on why he is doing the speech in the first place. His son went to Penn U, so he was already officiated with the school. Him sharing his information about his past with the school makes the crowd feel more relax and less anxious. Knowing the person who is speaking, understands what you are going through helps a lot in building a connection with the Washington. With a smooth beginning, Washington begins to tell jokes about the staff and how everyone here hates the Yankees. Washington, first establishing baseline with the audience, was key to conveyance his message to the spectators. Washington evens tells the people, that he is nervous and uncomfortable for he has not done this kind of speech before. The feeling of knowing this man in front of you is speaking to thousands of people is afraid, even though he is such a famous actor makes you feel empathy for him. This connection is strong for even though he is famous, he can still get nervous like all the graduates. Washington brings up ideas he had for this speech, making jokes about his co-workers and stories of them. He did not decide to use one of those because he wanted to leave a message worth leaving for the graduates that will last a lifetime. Washington even connects with the parents, by saying “I always like to check how my money is getting used, am I right parents?”. (Penn's 2011

Many people recognize Jim Carrey as the pet detective or the not-so-bright Lloyd Christmas, but during his commencement speech to the graduating class of 2014 at the Maharishi University of Management, he opens up to reveal a much deeper side of himself. While the speech he delivers is permeated with his traditional humor, Carrey also inspires his audience to think about how they want to conduct their lives. Carrey presents an effective argument for persuading college graduates who are entering the work field to not let fear control how they live. By successfully employing anecdote, analogy, and audience engagement, Carrey entices his audience to be willing to take risks and choose love over fear when approaching a career and other life

Anna Quindlen strongly urges the graduates to not follow after the worldly standards and desires of being “perfect,” but rather to be whom they truly are. Quindlen points out that each graduate is different from any other person in the entire world and she calls them to live that out as opposed to following the popular opinion. She uses reasoning from past experiences to encourage the graduates to not only stop following the beaten path but to also teach their future kids the same thing in order to impact the next generation.

Former President, Barack Obama, in his speech “Obama’s Commencement Address at Arizona State University”, the purpose is to convey the ideas that there is always more to do, always more to learn, and always more to achieve. His rhetoric is so successful because of his effective use of pathos, kairos, and structure matters.

David Wallace gave a unique commencement speech to the 2005 graduating class at Kenyon College. This is Water was not a typical commencement speech a person would except to hear at a college graduation. Nonetheless, Wallace’s speech help deliver the reality of how a typical adult life goes. It helped me realize that paying attention to others is vitally important

Barack Obama and Martin Luther King Jr. are both very influential African American leaders. Both have had an extremely positive impact on America, especially for the African American community. Obama spoke out about the past struggles, struggles of today, and what can be done to resolve these struggles for African American children in particular during his speech at the NAACP Centennial Convention in 2009. In King’s speech “I Have a Dream” given back in 1963, he spoke about the change that we need and how he believes we can get there. Obama and King’s use of repetition, analogies, and ethos determines the impact they are leaving on their audience. Although Obama gave a strong powerful speech, King used those rhetorical devices more effectively to leave an impact on his audience.

Additionally, in hopes to create an emotional connection between the audience, Jobs tells deeply personal stories. He explains how life is about connecting the dots. Through this story, Jobs talks about his youth from his adoption to his parents trying to afford to send him to Reed College. Through Jobs creating a sense of honesty and a sense of empathy, the students and audience start to begin seeing Jobs as a real person. After creating that sense, Jobs makes the students feel outraged after hearing his story about dropping out, building Apple, and then hearing about how he got fired from his own job.This leaves the audience questions like, “How could that happen to a man like him? Then Jobs leaves them feeling fearful of their own mortality after hearing about Jobs road with cancer. After having the graduates in the palms of his hands, Jobs leaves them with a message that he did not have an easy beginning very much like the other graduates and that this message will be with them forever as they overcome obstacles to success.

The speaker is clearly intending to motivate the audience to achieve higher. This is clear as the entirety of the speech is dedicated to him trying to motivate everyone to shoot for perfection and stop fearing failure.