How Things Work: Speech Vehicles Gone Wrong?
Every year I have students in one of my classes write speeches. One of the most difficult things to convey to students for these speech assignments is the purpose of a vehicle in a speech. A vehicle in your average grammar class refers to the verbiage of a metaphor. For example, the saying, “Rob Peter to Pay Paul,” conveys the message of taking something away from one person in order to pay another even if the people in question are neither Peter nor Paul. In this example, we used a common turn of phrase as a vehicle to convey a message.
Vehicles are essential for engaging speeches but can be difficult to explain and even harder to come up with spontaneously. As such, it's helpful to see an example of a vehicle in action.
In the speech, “Who You Callin’ Hysterical?”, Nadia Franzen starts by stating that she is not prone to emotional outbursts, revealing that she didn't even cry while watching Marley and Me (wish I could say the same). So, when Nadia “got emotional,” after watching inspiring stories of female athletes challenging the patriarchy in Nike's Dream Crazy campaign, the audience understands that the notion of women reclaiming the word "crazy" and defying the odds resonates with her. In the next sentence Nadia exclaims her surprise at seeing former athlete Alysia Montano sued Nike for discrimination after Alysia was told pregnancy would make the athlete, “too emotional, too unpredictable and even too crazy.”
At this point, we might be tempted to assume the speech is about advertising campaigns, the patriarchy, or being called crazy but these points from the introduction will serve in the vehicle of the speech. Nadia's speech focuses on hysteria and is structured around the following three main points:
History of hysteria as a medical diagnosis
How the evolution of hysteria on a small scale changed the religious and cultural landscape for women everywhere
The large-scale implications to what researchers at Columbia University on April 29th, 2019, called, “the most influential term in the history of marginalizing women for being women.”
If you watch the video linked above note that before Nadia transitions to her first point at the 3:00 mark, she begins talking about one of her favorite things to do trolling twitter for idiots. Nadia reads off comments like, “Steve 29: okay the only thing I understand less than the hashtag Game of Thrones hysteria is the number of insane women in the show ho just need to shut up and get a man lol.” This serves as a springboard for how Aristotle’s new wandering uterus disease has plagued women for centuries.
Note again how Nadia marks the transition between her first main point and her second main point by changing the tone of her speech at the 7:40 mark remarking, “Heeeeyyyy! It’s okay because we got rid of the official diagnosis and fixed everything only a short three hundred years later…” Nadia arrives at her second main point by changing her tone again and firmly stating, "but not really – hysteria set the stage for issues that we still see today." Nadia again moves between her second and third main point at the 8:39 mark citing, “finally there is perhaps no better time to talk about the importance of hysteria than now.”
Finally, at 10:32 Naida transitions to her conclusion stating, “Sigmund Freud has a fun little pet name for hysteria: the suffocating uterus and when he diagnosed hysteria which was often he placed a woman inside a glass room so that fellow doctors and patients could watch her: like entertainment. “ Nadia explains that until we as a society address the history of hysteria then the message of Nike’s dream crazy commercial will remain just a dream.
Altogether we see that Nadia used the following ideas to move through her speech:
Nike’s just a dream commercial
How twitter users use the term hysterical harkening back to Aristotle’s first diagnosis of the wandering uterus
Sarcastically remarks that the hysteria diagnosis no longer impacts women today
Stating hysteria sets the stage for today (it’s funny because she’s on a stage)
Sigmund’s Freud name for hysteria: the suffocating uterus
The unattainability of Nike’s dream commercial in a hysterical world
Note how the ideas mirror one another and support the speech without making up the heart of the speech. Essentially serving as transition sentences. This concept, which I call the "vehicle of the speech," remains a challenge to explain and implement effectively in the classroom to this day.
This leads us to the story of the How Things Work Project, a cornerstone of the physics department at Episcopal High School. In fact, students are informed that they cannot receive credit for Physics I without completing this project. The project begins with a visit to our school library, where students learn about conducting research using physical books. Students are tasked with selecting an everyday object, explaining the physics principles behind that object, and using books from our school library as supporting evidence. This was no problem for my students, and it took maybe 10-15 minutes for my students to find ample sources for their speech.
After writing down key facts and researching topics we discussed, as a class, how to write a speech and then practice that speech. I believe in practice over writing. Students can spend hours upon hours writing a speech word for word and trying to memorize it or cut their time in half by memorizing the facts and the vehicle of the speech before practicing delivering the speech. Even if the speech is a little different each time a student delivers it often times the audience receives a clearer, more cohesive message. Additionally, we talk about the importance of well-designed slides and not reading off notecards or PowerPoints. Again, most of this is straight-forward and students understood in no time. Where I lost them? The vehicle. Note this student work completed May 5th of 2023.
This student does an excellent jobs of using visuals and slides that enhance the message rather than relying on them to deliver the message. The student doesn’t rely on filler words or pauses showing confidence in the material being delivered. The student does a great job with signposting explaining, “first we’ll discuss Newton’s 3rd law of motion and secondly we’ll discuss Energy.” What I don’t see is a clearly defined transition between the first main point and the second main point beyond the changing of the slides. Moreover, the bookend closing that mirrors the introduction is missing as the speaker ends with, “Thank you so much for watching, this is my bibliography.” Overall I loved the speech. I felt like it was very well done and I was proud of the outcome.
In the next example we see a rudimentary metaphor comparing the physics of parachute to the yin and yang (and an audience featuring members of the classroom). The student calls gravity one side of the yin and yang because without drag this would turn into a free fall problem. I love the idea of comparing gravity and drag to the yin and yang but I would like to see this metaphor used as a vehicle that moves the speaker and audience through the speech. I posit a more involved introduction would help flesh out this metaphor.
In this next example we see a speech that starts out strong with a great hook, parties, a concept college students have some understanding of. While this student spends more time talking about the vehicle than perhaps the physics underlying sound and speakers this utilization of a vehicle is demonstrates a strong grasp of the speech concepts. This coupled with more practice would make for a solid, strong speech.
In this final example we see the perfect amalgamation of speech principles, physics principles and the utilization of technology. Where many students understandably struggled to turn in a speech featuring both the powerpoint and the speaker Oscar used PowerPoint to video himself. When I download the powerpoint and press, “Play from Start,” the powerpoint plays just like a video with Oscar at the bottom right of the screen. To turn this into a video I then took that PowerPoint file and exported it as an internet quality .mov.
Overall everyone did a fantastic job. They had a week to practice their speech skills while studying for AP exams, completing final projects and ramping up for graduation. I couldn’t be more proud. Still, looking to the future I hope to teach the idea of using a vehicle in speeches in a more cohesive, approachable manner.
