JONATHAN E. MCCOY'S SPEECH: A New Petition.

In my very first post, I used the example of my high school principal’s graduation commencement speech. Now that I have taken the CAS 100A course, I now know that that speech was a special event speech and its purpose was to celebrate our graduation. To me, my principal is still a great example of public speaking and her use of an anecdotal story to connect to the audience was a great move. Now I know that the anecdote was so effective because it appealed to the pathos of the audience.

Though, I still view her speech as an excellent example, it is no longer the first and only thing that comes to mind whenever I consider the term “public speaking.” I now can think of multiple types of speeches, which have various purposes other than to simply celebrate. The first type of public speaking that comes to mind now when I think of the term is public advocacy. I think these speeches appeal to me because they have a strong exigence, which necessitates the use of discourse to solve. They are very important speeches, as they often are a major step in raising awareness to a particular issue and influencing people to open their minds to the cause. They make something as simple as words and language a very powerful tool capable of inciting policy or even social change.

In the video that I have posted above, young McCoy protests against the social and cultural acceptance of the “N” word. He is a successful example of an advocacy speech as he is speaking to the community and asking that the use of the derogatory word be put to an end. He uses multiple examples of successful African American people who have accomplished much in their lives to make his point to the audience that the accomplishments of these people should not be undermined by the use of the “N” word. The introduction component of his speech has a very effective attention getter. The audience was also favorable as their race demographic allows for the educated guess that they will be in support of McCoy’s cause. Also, his delivery is, I think, the key to the powerful impact of his speech. He spoke clearly and passionately and delivered the speech in a conversational way, due to the lack of the use of note cards.

I do not think that public advocacy is the only important speech type by any means, but to me advocating for a policy is among the most important of the reasons for delivering speech. After all, free speech is an unalienable right and using it to support a belief is the concept that our country was founded upon.