Speech: Elie Wiesel – The Perils of Indifference

• An attention-getting opening
  • Wiesel does a good job of starting off his speech with a story because in this way not only is he setting up the basis of his speech in a creative way, but his story will further catch and retain the audience’s attention more than had he just gone straight into the speech.
• An introduction (which includes a thesis statement / proposition of fact, value or policy).
  • The introduction in this speech would be when Wiesel defines what indifference is and then goes into giving examples as to why people choose to remain indifferent in certain situations, even though choosing to remain indifferent is actually more harmful than people may realize.
• A body preview.
  • The body portion of this speech would be when Wiesel starts talking about how indifference isn’t beneficial to anybody and actually produces more harm than good because of the sole fact that when one chooses to remain indifferent in the face of dire situations, they are actually harming those who are the victims by ignoring their suffering.
• Three or four main points (with transitions between them).
  • Point 1: Indiffrence is much harmful than we realize because it is actually helping the aggressor
  • Point 2:  Choosing to remain indifferent esspecally when you see others suffering greatly is inhumane
  • Point 3: Indifference towards a certain subject matter can actually end something so quickly before there is even a chance to have an opinion and fix the issue.
• Aristotelian persuasive techniques (including ethos, pathos, and logos) 
  • “Wrapped in their torn blankets they would sit or lie on the ground staring vacantly into space unaware of who or where they were, strangers to their surroundings. They no longer felt pain, hunger, thirst. They felt nothing, they were dead and did not know it” (5:41-7:23)
    • This quote is a form of pathos because the imagery used evokes a deep sense of pity for these people and the situation they were placed in.
• A conclusion (which summarizes main points, and ends with a call to action).
  • ” This time the world was not silent. This time we do respond. This time we intervene” (18:17)
    • Ends off speech with talking about how the U.S can/is currently helping those who are in need of it most, and not only is it important for the government to be involved, but the rest of humanity must also care about those suffering around them and lend a helping hand in whatever way that they can.

How do you think this example may be helpful during the process of creating your own video speech?

This speech was a really profound example of argumentation and provided me with tactics I will implement in my own speech in order to make a more effective presentation. Something that stood out to me that I will definitely be drawing inspiration from is Wiesels’ integration of his moving personal experiences, which lend hand to both pathos and credibility, overall leading to a great speech that surely moved his entire audience to taking a call to action.

Izabella, Parker, and I discussed the requirements of the assignment together, and compared our individual strategies for making the project, which helped me gain more ideas and clarification going forwards with my speech. I got some ideas for formatting based off of my group mates own projects, and we discussed the various forms of visual aids we wanted to use and how to use them. We also talked about different ways to incorporate evidence and personal anecdotes to create convincing arguments. I feel like I have a lot of new confidence in my speech and inspiration for my it now after talking to my peers.

Play It By Ear

• To plan something as you do it. To decide plans as you’re about to do them based off of your previous circumstance and not know what to expect.
  • After school, where should we get lunch? I don’t know, we can just play it by ear after school ends

Let The Cat Out of The Bag

• To let information slip to people it wasn’t intended for
• Often used in context of ruining a surprise
  • Chris wasn’t supposed to know we were going to show up at his performance, but Sofia ran into him on her way there and let the cat out of the bag. He pretended to be surprised when the rest of us showed up, but he knew we were coming already.

Fishy

• A strange or suspicious situation
  • I thought something fishy was going on when I walked into my room and the lights were on already. It turns out, it was just my roommate home before me.

Cat Got Your Tongue

• To be left speechless, or to refrain from talking 
  • Why won’t you tell me what happened last night after you got back home form the party? Why are you shy? Cat got your tongue? 

Money Talks

• Money is influential, and can change people’s minds or opinions
  • The hotel said they didn’t have any more suites available, but money talks, so they gave us one after I gave the desk clerk a $20.

By: Briana Do

After reading the assignment prompt, I think that I will make my argumentative speech about abolishing the death penalty or how  recent marketing tactics, especially when promoting technology, unfairly targets young people by manipulating their minds towards screen addiction. I realize that these are two very different topics, and I plan on deciding based off of my research on both and determining which will have a more straightforward argument. For the death penalty, there is a lot more concrete examples and recent protests against it as many inmates on death row have now been recognized as being unfairly punished in the past due to discrimination. Regarding marketing and technology, it is a subject that interests me more, but I have less information on, which might make the assignment more difficult for me.

For the outline of my speech, I will first introduce the topic, provide context if needed, then delve into my main argument, followed by examples and evidence to back my argument, then followed with my personal proposed solution to conclude.

 

Volume (appropriate to our space and audience)

• Volume, although quite loud, is appropriate to space and audience because of Steve’s reputation as being a large presence. Volume enforces his reputation 

Variety of tone (enthusiasm, confidence, and engaging throughout)

• Effective variety of tone, especially in terms of enthusiasm and emphasis

• Confident and motivational throughout the speech and uses he his reputation to show his experience to the audience (ethos)

• Uses humor to lighten the mood and keep audience engaged 

• Uses specific examples to further relate his point to the audience

Eye contact with audience members (not floor, wall, or paper)

• Great interactive eye contact with audience throughout speech

Gestures and body movements that flow naturally and expressively 

• Uses hands to emphasize points and expressively keep the audience’s attention

By: Chinaza Hughes, Briana Do, Mel Zilinki

Race is a predominantly social construct due to its deep integration with societal norms and behaviors. It is clear not only from the speeches made by Laura Mae Lindo and Anthony Jack, but in real life as well that race plays an important, and often abused, role in our society to differentiate cultures and attitudes. Lindo mentions racial inequality in her district as an issue that became undermined by underrepresentation. The problem was seen as solved because of no active complaints or problems, when actually, there was just nobody at the table that could represent and bring up those problems. The problem I’ve just described is in no way a directly racially motivated exclusion, simply an ignorance of inequality. Ignorance that stems from the historical lack of inclusion of people of color from society. Nowadays, with such blatant exclusion no longer present, the silent exclusion, such as the chance that there’s no person of color on a board,  becomes harder to identify and recognize as racism.

Our society has created a certain mindset about people of color, and the intersectionality of race is often not thought about, merely accepted. When Jack mentions the miscommunication of the term “office hours,” it is a problem rooted in difference of social class, which also happens to be in tandem with difference of race. Such considerations of educational equality in understanding between race and social classes is often overlooked due to the difficult nature of spotting the problem itself. Other explanations of such inequalities are also deep rooted in historical racism, the shift of blame to the victim itself is all too familiar, rather than the intentions of solving the problem itself.

By: Briana Do

Activity 1: For a long time, my stepson, Jonathan, was unhappy to have me as part of his family, for he resents that he didn’t have both biological parents at home. I try to get to know him better, but he would complain that I invade his privacy. As a newcomer, I understood that our relationship will require effort from both of us. It is not enough that I was friendly. Jonathan also has to want us to be friends, and I was not happy with the two of us being strangers, but I can wait for him to feel more comfortable around me.

For a long time, my stepson, Jonathan, was unhappy to have me as part of his family; for he resents that he didn’t have both biological parents at home. I tried to get to know him better, but he would complain that I invaded his privacy. As a newcomer, I understood that our relationship would require effort from both of us. It was not enough that I was friendly. Jonathan also had to want us to be friends. Although I was not happy with the two of us being strangers, I can wait for him to feel more comfortable around me.

Activity 2: Anne Marie collects antique bottles and loved to turn them into works of art. She will buy bottles if she liked them, but she prefers to find them in the ground. She will find bottles everywhere, but she picked them selectively. However, she has the best luck at construction sites on old farmland, where she spent most of her time. Often, bottles appeared on the surface after a good rain, but they disappear very soon. She will use special tools for excavating bottles, including a set of brushes. She did not want to break the bottles as she removes them from the ground. After finding a new bottle, Anne Marie will add it to her display case and hung on the wall as an artistic piece (Mangelsdorf, 2013, p. 411).

Anne Marie collects antique bottles and loves to turn them into works of art. She buys bottles if she likes them, but she prefers to find them in the ground. She finds bottles everywhere, but she picks them selectively. However, she has the best luck at construction sites on old farmland, where she spends most of her time. Often, bottles appear on the surface after a good rain, but they disappear very soon. She uses special tools for excavating bottles, including a set of brushes. She does not want to break the bottles as she removes them from the ground. After finding a new bottle, Anne Marie usually adds it to her display case and hangs it on the wall as an artistic piece (Mangelsdorf, 2013, p. 411).

By: Lety Aquillino, Moriah Gilmore, Briana Do

Emma Gonzalez grounds her speech to the people at the March For Our Lives rally by comparing the setting of the rally to that of her high school on February 14, the day Nikolas Cruz opened fire to and killed 17 people, injuring 17 others. Gonzalez mentions the scorching heat, mass confusion, and feeling of “not knowing” to emphasize how such a severe situation isn’t so far away from real life. She then connects such thoughts to that of having to fight for change before it’s too late. Pathos is the main appeal for this speech, as Gonzalez hopes to convey the intensity at hand and severity of the issue that needs to be changed.

Her speech is actively, pretty short, as she then takes a prolonged moment of silence which is later revealed to be a 6 minute 20 second pause, the exact amount of time the shooting took place. The initial confusion of the crowd when Gonzalez stops speaking is eerily similar to the confusion she voiced just a minute earlier in her speech regarding the circumstances of the shooting. This is shown to be a very effective strategy for citing pathos, as the camera cuts to multiple shots of people in the crowd getting progressively more emotional as the silence continues.

 

• White rhinos are famous for their big horns, they are among the endangered species.
  • Correction: White rhinos are famous for their big horns; consequently, they are among the endangered species.

• The teacher didn’t know if she should laugh or cry; but she knew it was quite hilarious.
  • Correction: The teacher didn’t know if she should laugh or cry, but she knew it was quite hilarious.

• Three things matter in life; perseverance, commitment, and aptitude for learning.
  • Correction: Three things matter in life: perseverance, commitment, and aptitude for learning.

• A dog trotted over to the computer in Sara’s office; typed out a perfect letter; and printed it!
  • Correction: A dog trotted over to the computer in Sara’s office, typed out a perfect letter, and printed it!

• The manager was stunned; but she told the dog; “The sign says you have to be good with the computer, just because you’re good at typing doesn’t mean that you are good with it”. 
  • Correction: The manager was stunned, but she told the dog: “The sign says you have to be good with the computer; just because you’re good at typing doesn’t mean that you are good with it”.

• A man walked into a pet shop and ordered three things, centipede, kitten, parrot.
  • Correction: A man walked into a pet shop and ordered three things: a centipede, kitten, and parrot. 

• Sama was the best person for the job, because she had an excellent service record in one key area; community health training.
  • Correction: Sama was the best person for the job because she has an excellent service record in one key area: community health training

• Amy served with 4 stars in the army, therefore, she was awarded the Medal of Honor.
  • Correction : Amy served with 4 stars in the army; therefore, she was awarded the Medal of Honor.

By: Yana Walia, Melissa Zilinki, Briana Do

 

Exercise 1:

Combine each sentence pair into a single sentence using either a coordinating conjunction or a conjunctive adverb. Then copy the combined sentence onto your own sheet of paper.

1. Pets are not allowed in Mr. Taylor’s building. He owns several cats and a parrot.

Answer: Pets are not allowed in Mr. Taylor’s building, however, he owns several cats and a parrot. 

1. New legislation prevents drivers from sending or reading text messages while driving. Many people continue to use their phones illegally.

Answer: New legislation prevents drivers from sending or reading text messages while driving, but many people continue to use their phones illegally.

1. The coroner concluded that the young man had taken a lethal concoction of drugs. By the time his relatives found him, nothing could be done.

Answer: The coroner concluded that the young man had taken a lethal concoction of drugs, but by the time his relatives found him, nothing could be done.

1. Amphibians are vertebrates that live on land and in the water. Flatworms are invertebrates that live only in water.

Answer: Amphibians are vertebrates that live on land and in the water, however, flatworms are invertebrates that live only in water.

1. Ashley carefully fed and watered her tomato plants all summer. The tomatoes grew juicy and ripe.

Answer: Ashley carefully fed and watered her tomato plants all summer, so tomatoes grew juicy and ripe.

1. When he lost his car key, Simon attempted to open the door with a wire hanger, a credit card, and a paper clip. He called the manufacturer for advice.

Answer: When he lost his car key, Simon attempted to open the door with a wire hanger, a credit card, and a paper clip, finally, he called the manufacturer for advice.

 

Exercise 2:

Combine each sentence pair into a single sentence using a subordinating conjunction and then copy the combined sentence onto your own sheet of paper.

1. Jake is going to Mexico. There are beautiful beaches in Mexico.

Answer: Jake is going to Mexico, as there are beautiful beaches.

1. A snowstorm disrupted traffic all over the east coast. There will be long delivery delays this week.

Answer: A snowstorm disrupted traffic all over the east coast, so there will be long delivery delays this week.

1. My neighbor had his television volume turned up too high. I banged on his door and asked him to keep the noise down.

Answer: My neighbor had his television volume turned up too high until I banged on his door and asked him to keep the noise down. 

1. Jessica prepared the potato salad and the sautéed vegetables. Ashley marinated the chicken.

Answer: Jessica prepared the potato salad and the sautéed vegetables, while Ashley marinated the chicken.

1. Romeo poisons himself. Juliet awakes to find Romeo dead and stabs herself with a dagger.

Answer: After Romeo poisons himself, Juliet awakes to find Romeo dead and stabs herself with a dagger.

By: Briana Do, Zushan Liu, Moriah Gilmore