tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-39910933697167808892024-03-08T07:09:37.950-05:00The Eloquent WomanInspiration, ideas and information to help women build public speaking content, confidence and credibility. Denise Graveline is a Washington, DC-based speaker coach who has coached nearly 200 TEDMED and TEDx speakers--including one of 2016's most popular TED talks. She also has prepared speakers for presentations, testimony, and keynotes. She offers 1:1 coaching and group workshops in public speaking, presentation and media interview skills to both men and women.eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.comBlogger1773135tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-80742856974486700362020-10-01T06:56:00.003-04:002020-10-01T07:18:03.560-04:00A Message From Denise Graveline's Family<p style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 0px; padding: 0px;">Hello,</p><p style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 0px; padding: 0px;"><strong>Please don’t be alarmed. This is a message from Denise Graveline's family.</strong></p><p style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 0px; padding: 0px;">Before Denise sadly passed away in 2018, you opted to receive updates from her storytelling and speaker coaching blogs.</p><p style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 0px; padding: 0px;">As her family, we commissioned a memorial website to be made as a full collection of her blog posts and works, allowing friends, fans and followers to read, remember and share their memories of Denise.</p><p style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 0px; padding: 0px;">It has been indexed and categorised so please do play around with the search function and see what hidden treasures you can unearth.</p><p style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: center;"><strong>You can find the new website here: <a class="ng-scope" data-link-id="421087922" href="https://www.denisegraveline.org" style="color: #f04736;" target="_blank">www.denisegraveline.org</a>.</strong></p><p style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 0px; padding: 0px;">If you have memories of time spent with Denise or have been helped by her, we'd love you to share your memories within the 'Memories' section of the new website.</p><p style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 0px; padding: 0px;">Likewise, Denise had a collection of unpublished work which we shall be releasing over the coming months - so we encourage you to check back regularly.</p><p style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 0px; padding: 0px;">We hope you enjoy this beautiful memorial to our Denise.</p><p style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 0px; padding: 0px;">Denise started her blogs to help people, particularly women, find - and use - their voice. We want her voice to live on and to continue doing just that. We would love it if you shared this collection of her written work with women you know (and men) who might benefit from her wisdom, knowledge and insight.</p><p style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 0px; padding: 0px;">Warm wishes,</p><p style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 0px; padding: 0px;"><strong>Joe Graveline And Family</strong><br /><strong>(Brother to Denise)</strong></p><p style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 0px; padding: 0px;">P.S. Lastly, if you would like to link to any of her work, please review the copyright info on the site, so all are clear about acceptable use.</p><i></i>Hastingsbiz.co.uk Teamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10224301340493975623noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-71098164119652613052018-02-16T05:15:00.000-05:002018-02-16T05:15:06.206-05:00Famous Speech Friday: Lillian Gilbreth on the human side of automation<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-HGPr5PidtBA/VLKYndx12bI/AAAAAAAANP4/7LTGzOPMISI/s1600/Gilbreth_01.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-HGPr5PidtBA/VLKYndx12bI/AAAAAAAANP4/7LTGzOPMISI/s1600/Gilbreth_01.jpg" width="230" /></a></div>
Today, when people are fretting about Amazon putting robots in place of cashiers at Whole Foods, and voice assistants are common productivity tools, we are still using the principles of humanizing automation that were first advanced by psychologist, engineer, and famous mom Lillian Gilbreth.<br />
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<a href="http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Frank_and_Lillian_Gilbreth">With her husband Frank, she embarked on "motion study"</a>--the movements and micro-motions we make in doing any task--but her emphasis always was on the human aspect of making movement more efficient. Her insights led to many things we take for granted, from shelves inside refrigerator doors to step-on levers that lift the lids of trash cans, among many others, and helped major companies make their assembly-line production more efficient and cost-effective. I could make a case for calling her a pioneer in UX, the user experience.<br />
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Gilbreth had 12 children with her husband, famously captured by two of her children in the book <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0060763132/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0060763132&linkCode=as2&tag=theelowom-20">Cheaper by the Dozen</a>. At home, the children were a testbed for ideas, learning languages and doing chores using motion study. But when Frank Gilbreth died unexpectedly, Lillian had to expand her range to include more public speaking. In <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0060598239/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0060598239&linkCode=as2&tag=theelowom-20">Belles on Their Toes</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="https://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=theelowom-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0060598239" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" />, the sequel to <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0060763132/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0060763132&linkCode=as2&tag=theelowom-20">Cheaper by the Dozen</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="https://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=theelowom-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0060763132" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" />, the book begins with her departure for Europe, just days after her husband's death. She was headed to two major engineering meetings where he had committed to speak.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
She had been invited to substitute for him at the two sessions. At first, it seemed out of the question to accept. And then it seemed to be the one opportunity of keeping the family together. Engineering was, and still is, a man's field. Mother knew there would be difficulties in trying to continue Dad's business. But if she made a success of her two speeches in Europe, before some of the biggest engineers in the world, she might have an easier time in convincing Dad's clients that she could do the work.</blockquote>
It was a case of public speaking helping to establish her reputation in her own right. And it worked. After she began speaking, major companies--Macy's department stores, IBM, Johnson & Johnson, and more--hired her to advise them, and the family consulting business continued.<br />
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Considered the "first lady of engineering," and the first person to get a degree in industrial psychology, Gilbreth became a frequent and in-demand speaker throughout her long life. In 1957, when she was 79, she keynoted the national conference of the Society of Women Engineers, speaking on "The Human Side of Automation." And her message to engineers still works today:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
There are two things it seems to me engineering groups have to offer when when any type of problem comes up and one is the code of ethics which we all share. It’s a very simple code stated in the beginning as being our responsibility “to do our best to utilize the resources of nature for the benefit of mankind.” I suppose the people who first worded the code thought it was self-evident that the resources of nature would include the resources of human nature, but some people didn’t seem to recognize that and so the code was expanded. And now it reads “to utilize the resources of nature <i>and of human nature</i> for the benefit of mankind.” And there you see we have human being really emphasized twice. First, as being an enormous resource and second, as being the reason for, the cause why we are using these resources at all. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
And surely if there ever was a time when we needed to go on record not only as a profession, but as a people that we believe these resources should be used and should be used for benefit of mankind and not the harm of mankind, this is the time. And the other thing we have to offer, of course, is the scientific method. The questioning method. Not the kind of question, the Socratic kind, which we ask because we’re trying to show that somebody doesn’t know very much. Not even the legal type of question. But the simple question that a child asks when he really is intellectually curious and he wants to know the answer and he’s intelligent enough to listen to what is said. So I think we have those two things to offer and as we look at these challenges which are coming to everybody, perhaps we see as we put the question to ourselves that we do have a special responsibility.</blockquote>
What can you learn from this famous speech?<br />
<ul>
<li><b>A lifetime of public speaking experience can start anytime: </b>Gilbreth was in her mid-40s when her husband's sudden death forced her into public speaking. She was in her mid-90s when she died, and as this speech shows, she was a speaker for nearly half her life, a good four to five decades, despite her "late start."</li>
<li><b>Don't be a <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=define+one-trick+pony&rlz=1CAACAV_enUS723US723&oq=define+one-trick+pony&aqs=chrome..69i57j0l3.4009j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8">one-trick pony</a>: </b>Gilbreth pursued both automation and psychology because she was fascinated by both. That meant that, when technology became an issue at odds with humans, whether on the factory floor or in the broader society, she was equipped to talk about both in a meaningful way. You can do the same with your specialty by finding a way to broaden your expertise to another realm, and then combine the two in your speaking. It will expand your utility as a sought-after speaker.</li>
<li><b>Speaking to others in your profession? Take them to higher ground:</b> Much of Gilbreth's expertise was in the weeds, the details and micro-details of how people move, behave, and think about tasks. But in this speech to colleagues, she took them back to the noble goals of the profession. Your professional conference isn't just a place for hands-on learning, but if you're the keynote speaker, taking the audience to a higher place and making them think is part of the job.</li>
</ul>
You can <a href="http://reuther.wayne.edu/audio/by/title/gilbreth_keynote_speech">go here to listen to the audio recording of the keynote</a>. And here's a short video summary of her accomplishments:<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="true" allowtransparency="true" frameborder="0" height="400" scrolling="no" src="https://www.facebook.com/plugins/video.php?href=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2FDailyCupOfJane%2Fvideos%2F841194296036198%2F&show_text=0&width=400" style="border: none; overflow: hidden;" width="400"></iframe><br />
<i>(Rutgers University archive photo of Gilbreth in 1921, three years before her husband's death.)</i><br />
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<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-20809760659189127972018-02-15T05:15:00.000-05:002018-02-15T05:15:46.445-05:00African-American Folktales: New resource for storytellers<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-BNMsg0eyk18/WkkQRNqs38I/AAAAAAAASUA/-v4zIkMNczwvhvTSw5STvoIGX0-levLngCLcBGAs/s1600/folk.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="425" height="320" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-BNMsg0eyk18/WkkQRNqs38I/AAAAAAAASUA/-v4zIkMNczwvhvTSw5STvoIGX0-levLngCLcBGAs/s320/folk.jpg" width="272" /></a></div>
If you're looking for a gift to mark Black History Month, look no further: <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Annotated-African-American-Folktales-Books-ebook/dp/B06XP2MBWF/ref=mt_kindle?_encoding=UTF8&me=&_encoding=UTF8&tag=theelowom-20&linkCode=ur2&linkId=ce477187422efbee516f2521ae5eae7a&camp=1789&creative=9325" target="_blank">The Annotated African American Folktales</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="//ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?t=theelowom-20&l=ur2&o=1" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" /> is a treasure trove for storytellers who want to draw on African and African-American folktales. More than 100 examples are collected and annotated here by a stellar pair of experts: Henry Louis Gates, Jr., a scholar of African and African-American research, and Maria Tatar, who studies folklore and fairy tales. (You can read more about their unusual collaboration in this <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/14/books/gates-tatar-book-african-american-folk-tales.html">New York Times review.</a>)<br />
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Each author provides an introduction that's a short course in how to approach these tales appropriately. They include in the collection now-controversial versions of African-American tales created by Walt Disney and others, since they, too, are now part of the canon. And they discuss how modern authors like Toni Morrison have adapted some of the African and African-American folktales in more modern work.<br />
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2018 is shaping up already as a great year for books with useful resources for speechwriters and public speakers interested in good storytelling. Be sure to add this volume to your bookshelf.<br />
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<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-30619950094816194732018-02-12T05:15:00.000-05:002018-02-12T05:15:01.491-05:00The Eloquent Woman's weekly speaker toolkit<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">I read a lot about women and public speaking, and post my finds first on </span><a href="http://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman" style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">The Eloquent Woman on Facebook</a>. But <span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">I always collect them here for you on Mondays as well. Here's what I've been reading lately:</span><br />
<ul>
<li><b style="line-height: 18px;">Did you miss? </b><span style="line-height: 18px;">This week, the blog looked at and Famous Speech Friday shared a speech by </span></li>
<li><b style="line-height: 18px;">About the quote:</b></li>
</ul>
<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-79975582108596893152018-02-09T04:45:00.000-05:002018-02-09T04:45:02.342-05:00Famous Speech Friday: Ashton Applewhite's TED talk "Let's stop ageism"<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-kFi1hecOyBk/WY-Ki4glwUI/AAAAAAAASEg/1wqWoYd91OsgDtaDewyzmf5kCWu6KgHrACLcBGAs/s1600/Ashton.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="728" data-original-width="870" height="267" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-kFi1hecOyBk/WY-Ki4glwUI/AAAAAAAASEg/1wqWoYd91OsgDtaDewyzmf5kCWu6KgHrACLcBGAs/s320/Ashton.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
Writer Ashton Applewhite has made ageism her target with the <a href="https://thischairrocks.com/">This Chair Rocks</a> blog and <a href="http://yoisthisageist.com/">Yo, is this ageist?</a> blog. And in her 2017 TED talk, she made a call to action to the audience, since, as she made clear from the start, older is what everyone in the room is going to become.<br />
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This is a polished, well-paced, often funny TED talk that not only walked the audience through contradictory ideas we share about aging, but modeled the very behavior Applewhite was encouraging. But the core of the talk is its logical arguments. Applewhite busts myths about aging, offers alternative data, and compares, effectively, ageism to other forms of discrimination. Here's the centerpiece of her speech:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Older people can be the most ageist of all, because we've had a lifetime to internalize these messages and we've never thought to challenge them. I had to acknowledge it and stop colluding. "Senior moment" quips, for example: I stopped making them when it dawned on me that when I lost the car keys in high school, I didn't call it a "junior moment." </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
I stopped blaming my sore knee on being 64. My other knee doesn't hurt, and it's just as old. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
We are all worried about some aspect of getting older, whether running out of money, getting sick, ending up alone, and those fears are legitimate and real. But what never dawns on most of us is that the experience of reaching old age can be better or worse depending on the culture in which it takes place. It is not having a vagina that makes life harder for women. It's sexism.</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
It's not loving a man that makes life harder for gay guys. It's homophobia. And it is not the passage of time that makes getting older so much harder than it has to be. It is ageism. When labels are hard to read or there's no handrail or we can't open the damn jar, we blame ourselves, our failure to age successfully, instead of the ageism that makes those natural transitions shameful and the discrimination that makes those barriers acceptable. You can't make money off satisfaction, but shame and fear create markets, and capitalism always needs new markets. Who says wrinkles are ugly? The multi-billion-dollar skin care industry. Who says perimenopause and low T and mild cognitive impairment are medical conditions? The trillion-dollar pharmaceutical industry. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The more clearly we see these forces at work, the easier it is to come up with alternative, more positive and more accurate narratives. Aging is not a problem to be fixed or a disease to be cured. It is a natural, powerful, lifelong process that unites us all.</blockquote>
And a word about Applewhite's outfit: It's got lots of interesting detail in the top, which we are able to see because it is not black. I can't tell you how many TED talks I've seen where the gorgeous dressmaker details cannot be seen--either in the hall by the live audience, or on camera--because the speaker didn't listen to instructions not to wear black. Not a problem here.<br />
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What can you learn from this famous speech?<br />
<ul>
<li><b>You don't need a personal story to give a TED talk: </b>This talk is all about the data and logic, not about a well-crafted personal story. Yes, Applewhite includes some personal perspective here and there--see her knees, above--but this is a great example of an effective, story-less TED talk.</li>
<li><b>Tone is everything:</b> Applewhite tackles a topic no one likes to discuss, and which provokes a lot of anxiety. But her delivery is direct and non-anxious, well-paced but not frenetic. She's modeling the tone she hopes we'll take in discussing aging in a forthright manner, a great job for your talks about controversial topics to take on.</li>
<li><b>A strong call to action is essential</b> for a talk where you've layered on the data and logic. What should we do now that we know all this. Applewhite doesn't waste the moment, making a clear call to action in this convincing talk.</li>
</ul>
<div>
You can <a href="https://www.ted.com/talks/ashton_applewhite_let_s_end_ageism">see the talk here</a> or below.</div>
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="480px" mozallowfullscreen="" scrolling="no" src="https://embed.ted.com/talks/ashton_applewhite_let_s_end_ageism" webkitallowfullscreen="" width="450px"></iframe><br />
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<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-12312702230111769652018-02-08T05:15:00.000-05:002018-02-08T05:15:02.129-05:00Manal al-Sharif on women speaking up in Saudi Arabia<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-gcvfwdj9KOU/WTsCgs80GrI/AAAAAAAARnk/VSisLeY6DnAZCcXIuycelComwmS1qawZACLcB/s1600/51YkYbPKIrL.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="331" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-gcvfwdj9KOU/WTsCgs80GrI/AAAAAAAARnk/VSisLeY6DnAZCcXIuycelComwmS1qawZACLcB/s320/51YkYbPKIrL.jpg" width="211" /></a></div>
<a href="http://amzn.to/2rVnFFD">Daring to Drive: A Saudi Woman's Awakening</a> is the new book from Manal Al-Sharif, the Saudi woman who got the world's attention by breaking her country's ban on women driving cars with a YouTube video.<br />
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Now a resident of Australia, Al-Sharif is on a book tour and was interviewed recently by NPR's Terry Gross on Fresh Air. Many of her comments touched on her motivation for speaking up, the forces that prevent women from doing so, and the penalties for outspoken women.<br />
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<a href="http://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?storyId=532068532">From the transcript</a>, after describing egregious discrimination against women, Al-Sharif said:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
AL-SHARIF: So these things really make you speak up. Most people inside are too afraid to speak up because the backlash from the society and from the government is unbearable. We live in one of the last absolute monarchies in the world. Men and women don't have political or civil rights. So imagine someone comes and asks for their civil rights. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The backlash is really huge. You get harassed. You get banned from leaving the country, which as we call it the internal exile. You lose your job. You cannot land a job after that, which was the case with me when I left my job. So the price - the personal price you pay is really high. And they make sure that everyone knows, so they don't follow you. They don't walk in your path.</blockquote>
Later in the interview, she spoke again about the price of speaking up:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
GROSS: Are you going back to Saudi Arabia anytime in the near future? </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
AL-SHARIF: Yes, of course. I have my son there. So after the tour, right away I'm going back to Saudi. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
GROSS: Are you worried? </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
AL-SHARIF: Hopefully I don't get arrested. I I'm always worried. Every time I go to Saudi Arabia, I'm always worried because it's never - you never know when you get arrested again for a tweet or a retweet or something you said in an interview like what I'm doing now with you, something that slipped. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
So you have to always have this filter going on the whole time you talk. Can I say this or not? Will this get me in trouble or not? Because at the end of the day, I always think I'm going back to Saudi. I have to - I want to see my son. So it's tricky.</blockquote>
Read more about Al-Sharif's driving campaign and the speech that brought it to the world in our <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2012/06/famous-speech-friday-manal-al-sharif-on.html">Famous Speech Friday post about her</a>.<br />
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<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-7752902855987941182018-02-05T05:13:00.000-05:002018-02-05T05:13:04.345-05:00The Eloquent Woman's weekly speaker toolkit<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">I read a lot about women and public speaking, and post my finds first on </span><a href="http://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman" style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">The Eloquent Woman on Facebook</a>. But <span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">I always collect them here for you on Mondays as well. Here's what I've been reading lately:</span><br />
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<li><b>Let's look at the data; </b><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/10/us/politics/women-economics.html">Wielding Data, Women Force a Reckoning Over Bias in the Economics Field</a> showed how these women economists used a conference panel to demonstrate discrimination by the numbers.</li>
<li><b style="line-height: 18px;">Did you miss? </b><span style="line-height: 18px;">This week, the blog looked at and Famous Speech Friday shared a speech by </span></li>
<li><b style="line-height: 18px;">About the quote:</b></li>
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<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-72928016680322619482018-02-02T05:13:00.000-05:002018-02-02T05:13:37.453-05:00For #BlackHistoryMonth, 50 famous speeches by black women<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-vkQ1-PPKEG0/Wm5LvIJugyI/AAAAAAAASXk/_cQvMC5ozdU1vQIDhdxADXsr2g4-R8rjwCLcBGAs/s1600/24b03fe84cab77617d387798449a7e092aef1a4c6da270e8737c58768df162e4-682x1024%2B%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="342" data-original-width="437" height="250" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-vkQ1-PPKEG0/Wm5LvIJugyI/AAAAAAAASXk/_cQvMC5ozdU1vQIDhdxADXsr2g4-R8rjwCLcBGAs/s320/24b03fe84cab77617d387798449a7e092aef1a4c6da270e8737c58768df162e4-682x1024%2B%25281%2529.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
Black women speakers from all over the world are often featured in <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/p/the-eloquent-woman-index-of-famous.html">The Eloquent Woman Index</a> of Famous Speeches by Women. Whether African, American or from elsewhere in the world, they make up close to 20 percent of the speeches we've collected and featured so far. And every year, this expanding collection of speeches by black women is the most-read post on the blog! Check out the 50 famous speeches from the Index given by black women speakers, arranged in chronological order from 1851 to the present. At the links, you will find (where available) video, photos, transcripts or texts, along with what you can learn from these speeches to improve your own public speaking:<br />
<ol>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2011/04/famous-speech-friday-sojourner-truth.html"><b>Sojourner Truth's 1851 speech "Ain't I a Woman?"</b></a> is oft-quoted, but has a disputed source, illustrating why it's often tough to find famous women's speeches. In this case, that happened because Truth could neither read nor write. That doesn't detract at all from her message about equality for all women of all races. Read <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/143583710X/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=theelowom-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=143583710X">Soujourner Truth's "Ain't I a Woman" Speech: A Primary Source Investigation</a> for more about the many versions of this speech, only one of which contains the most-quoted phrase.</li>
<li><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2016/09/famous-speech-friday-mary-ann-shadd.html">Mary Ann Shadd Cary's 1858 "Break Every Yoke"</a> </b>defied the norms against women--and black women especially--speaking in public. This sermon demonstrates why she was such a popular antislavery speaker in the years leading up to the American Civil War.</li>
<li><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2016/04/famous-speech-friday-harriet-tubmans.html">Harriet Tubman's 1859 fable about colonizing slaves</a></b> tackled one of the proposals to end slavery--by sending American slaves to Africa--with a simple story anyone could remember and repeat. It brought the house down at an antislavery rally.</li>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2012/12/famous-speech-friday-ida-b-wellss-1909.html"><b>Ida B. Wells's 1909 "This Awful Slaughter"</b></a> busted the myth that women's safety was the reason lynchings were carried out, and used a mix of data and defiance to fight against the practice of mob killings of black men. Read the book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/080901646X/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=080901646X&linkCode=as2&tag=theelowom-20">To Tell the Truth Freely: The Life of Ida B. Wells</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="https://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=theelowom-20&l=as2&o=1&a=080901646X" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" /> to learn more about her campaign.</li>
<li><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2013/02/famous-speech-friday-josephine-baker-at.html">Josephine Baker at the March on Washington</a> </b>shares the brief remarks of the lone woman to share the program with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and scores of other male speakers. Those who thought of her as a notorious showgirl learned more about her self-enforced exile to France as a way of seeking racial equality.</li>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2012/09/famous-speech-friday-fannie-lou-hamers.html"><b>Fannie Lou Hamer's 1964 convention committee testimony</b></a> failed to gain her a seat at that convention, but succeeded in raising the visibility of violence against blacks attempting to register to vote. Four years later, she became an historic convention delegate. You can read more about her public speaking in <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1604738227/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=1604738227&linkCode=as2&tag=theelowom-20">The Speeches of Fannie Lou Hamer: To Tell It Like It Is</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="https://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=theelowom-20&l=as2&o=1&a=1604738227" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" />.</li>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2011/01/famous-speech-fridays-coretta-scott.html"><b>Coretta Scott King's 1968 "10 Commandments on Vietnam"</b></a> -- a speech she gave in her husband's place, just weeks after his assassination -- took scribbled notes found in his pockets and made them into a powerful call to action. <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0817317651/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0817317651&linkCode=as2&tag=theelowom-20">Desert Rose: The Life and Legacy of Coretta Scott King</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="https://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=theelowom-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0817317651" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" /> is a recent biography. This post was our very first Famous Speech Friday entry!</li>
<li><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2013/04/famous-speech-friday-shirley-chisholm.html">Shirley Chisholm introducing the Equal Rights Amendment</a></b> in 1969 wasn't a first. This member of Congress was re-introducing the legislation, 40 years after it was first proposed--and did so in her usual fiery and forthright style.</li>
<li><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2016/10/famous-speech-friday-shirley-chisholms.html">Shirley Chisholm's contested debate time</a></b> during the 1972 presidential election campaign came after she was shut out of network television debates, and sued--creating a precedent that helps women candidates even today.</li>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2011/02/famous-speech-friday-barbara-jordans.html"><b>Barbara Jordan's 1976 Democratic convention keynote</b></a> broke barriers for women and for blacks in one speech, suggesting that "the American Dream need not be deferred." It's loaded with elegant rhetoric and is a wonderful listen, thanks to Jordan's vocalizing skills. <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1563383020/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=theelowom-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=1563383020">A Private Woman in Public Spaces: Barbara Jordan's Speeches on Ethics, Public Religion, and Law</a> takes a focused look at the speeches of one of America's most eloquent women.</li>
<li><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2011/10/famous-speech-friday-anita-hills-senate.html">Anita Hill's 1981 Senate testimony about Clarence Thomas</a> </b>disrupted the Senate confirmation hearings of the then-nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court, leveling sexual harrassment allegations against him that ultimately did not prevent his appointment to the court. "It would have been more comfortable to remain silent," she said in this televised testimony that stunned viewers and brought harrassment into the open as an issue. In <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0385476272/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0385476272&linkCode=as2&tag=theelowom-20">Speaking Truth to Power</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="https://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=theelowom-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0385476272" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" />, she tells her story.</li>
<li><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2014/05/famous-speech-friday-maya-angelous.html">Maya Angelou's 1995 poem, "Phenomenal Woman,"</a> </b>often delivered by her and others as a speech, summed up for me and many others what made this frequent speaker so special. Listen closely to her charming delivery.</li>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2011/02/famous-speech-friday-maya-angelous.html"><b>Angelou's 2006 eulogy for Coretta Scott King</b></a> might be any eulogy from one close friend for another, as Angelou tells stories about the civil rights icon that only a girlfriend would know. This is a lovely, simple and moving tribute.</li>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2011/07/famous-speech-friday-edwidge-danticats.html"><b>Edwidge Danticat's 2007 testimony on death in detention</b></a> gave the novelist a gripping real-life story to tell, about her uncle's treatment at the hands of U.S. immigration and customs officials when he was held in detention. It's moving, direct and powerful, just like her fictional writings. You can read more about this dramatic story in her book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1400034302/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=1400034302&linkCode=as2&tag=theelowom-20">Brother, I'm Dying</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="https://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=theelowom-20&l=as2&o=1&a=1400034302" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" />.</li>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2011/04/famous-speech-friday-reps-jackie-speier.html"><b>Rep. Gwen Moore's 2011 floor speech on abortion rights and family planning</b></a> came during a debate about federal funding for family planning. She chose to use her status as a member of Congress to share a personal perspective as a former teenage mother.</li>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2011/09/first-lady-michelle-obamas-speech-to.html"><b>Michelle Obama's 2011 speech to young African women leaders</b></a> took place in a powerful setting, and used that visual reminder to call these young women to action. <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0982375638/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=theelowom-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0982375638">Michelle Obama: Speeches on Life, Love, and American Values</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="https://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=theelowom-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0982375638" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" /> collects speeches of our current First Lady, preserving the legacy of a frequent speaker.</li>
<li><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2012/01/famous-speech-friday-actress-viola.html">Viola Davis's 2011 awards acceptance speech, "What keeps me in the business is hope,"</a> </b>went far beyond the usual platitudes and confronted what it's like to be a black actress in the movie industry. An eloquent extemporaneous speech.</li>
<li><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2014/01/famous-speech-friday-chimamanda.html">Chimamanda Adichie's "we should all be feminists,"</a></b> a 2012 TEDxEuston talk, has inspired pop icons and women and men around the world with its frank, funny, and fierce viewpoint.</li>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2012/11/famous-speech-friday-michelle-obama-at.html#"><b>Michelle Obama's 2012 Democratic National Convention speech</b></a> follows a formula for memorable speeches recommended by President John F. Kennedy's speechwriter, Ted Sorensen. And it worked with today's audiences, garnering more than 28,000 tweets per second from those who watched it.</li>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2012/06/famous-speech-friday-viola-daviss.html"><b>Viola Davis's 2012 commencement speech is titled "Go out and live!"</b></a> It's a stunning example of what you can do with a tired speaking format, and is like no college commencement speech you've ever endured. Perhaps my favorite line: <span style="font-family: inherit;">"T<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">he two most important days in your life are the day you were born, and the day you discover why you were born."</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2013/05/famous-speech-friday-ellen-johnson.html">Ellen Johnson Sirleaf's 2013 Harvard commencement speech</a></b> shared the dreams and roadblocks in the Liberian president's stellar career. She says, "If your dreams do not scare you, they're not big enough."</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2013/06/famous-speech-friday-essie-washington.html">Essie Washington-Williams's 2013 "I feel completely free"</a> </b>told the world a secret she'd kept most of her life: She was the daughter of a black woman and Senator Strom Thurmond, a white segregationist who campaigned against civil rights.</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2013/12/famous-speech-friday-joyce-bandas.html">Joyce Banda's tribute to Nelson Mandela</a></b> at his memorial service in 2013 wasn't a remarkable text--until the Malawi president went off-script and put in the color and creativity she got in part from her mentor.</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2013/01/famous-speech-friday-myrlie-evers.html"><b>Myrlie Evers-Williams's invocation at President Obama's second inaugural</b></a> in 2013 marked the first time the invocation at the ceremony was given by a woman, and by someone other than a member of the clergy. The widow of assassinated civil rights activist Medgar Evers summoned the spirits of the leaders of that movement to witness the day's proceedings. Read more about her story in her memoir <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0316255203/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0316255203&linkCode=as2&tag=theelowom-20">Watch Me Fly: What I Learned on Becoming the Woman I Was Meant to Be</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="https://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=theelowom-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0316255203" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" />.</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2013/10/famous-speech-friday-leymah-gbowees.html">Leymah Gbowee's 2013 Barnard commencement speech</a></b> had the Liberian Nobel laureate urging women to "step out of the shadows" and get more credit for their work.</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2014/06/famous-speech-friday-gabourey-sidibes.html"><b>Gabourey Sidibe's speech at the 2014 Gloria Awards</b></a> used an iconic photo of her aunt and Gloria Steinem to honor Steinem, and to talk about being confident despite how she's taunted because of her weight.</span></span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2014/06/famous-speech-friday-michelle-obamas.html">Michelle Obama's eulogy for Maya Angelou in 2014</a></b> echoed words from "Phenomenal Woman" and told how the poet inspired her as a child.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2014/10/famous-speech-friday-kerry-washington.html">Kerry Washington spoke in 2014 on the risks of public speaking</a></b> for women and women of color, admitting she'd turned down the chance to give a TED talk in an award acceptance speech.</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2014/08/famous-speech-friday-rashema-melsons.html">Rashema Melson's 2014 high school valedictory speech</a></b> made headlines because the speaker overcame homelessness to graduate at the top of her class and get into Georgetown. A short, fierce, fantastic speech.</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2014/04/famous-speech-friday-laverne-cox-on.html">Laverne Cox gave a 2014 keynote on transgender activism</a></b> for the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force meeting, offering inspiration and encouragement to local activists.</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2014/03/famous-speech-friday-lupita-nyongo-on.html">Lupita Nyong'o used a 2014 acceptance speech</a></b> at a Hollywood luncheon to talk about the conflicting views we have about black women and beauty in a revealing, resonant talk.</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2015/01/famous-speech-friday-viola-davis.html">Viola Davis's 2014 acceptance speech focused on hunger</a>, </b>taking a Hollywood audience to the dumpsters where she dived for food as a child, and speaking abou the importance of public speaking to shed light on so-called "unspeakable" issues. A riveting short speech.</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2015/11/famous-speech-friday-shonda-rhimess-you.html">Shonda Rhimes's "You are not alone" speech</a> </b>at the Human Rights Campaign Fund awards in 2015 expanded on one of her favorite themes: It's not "diversity," it's reflecting what is normal that makes her work inclusive.</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2015/10/famous-speech-friday-keila-bankss.html">Keila Banks's "Undefinable Me"</a></b> was the 13-year-old's keynote at a major tech conference, where she put the lie to common perceptions of who is and is not technically adept.</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2015/09/famous-speech-friday-viola-davis-at.html">Viola Davis brought the house down at the 2015 Emmy Awards</a></b>, where she captured the first best actress in a drama award for a black woman, with an acceptance speech that left no doubt about the importance and weight of that moment.</span></span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2015/09/famous-speech-friday-chimamanda-ngozi.html">Chimamanda Ngozi Adiche calls likability a barrier to authentic storytelling</a></b>, a message she gave to young girls in 2015 that should resonate with every eloquent woman.</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2015/08/famous-speech-friday-linda-cliatt.html">Linda Cliatt-Wayman closed the 2015 TEDWomen conference</a></b> with this powerful message about education in troubled schools, prompted by a moment when she was interrupted mid-speech by a student.</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2015/03/famous-speech-friday-rep-terri-sewells.html">Rep. Terri Sewell's remarks at the 2015 anniversary of the civil rights march on Selma</a></b>, Alabama, in 1965, shared her perspective as a living marker of progress--she grew up there, and now represents the city in the U.S. Congress. And she made President Obama laugh during her remarks, always a plus.</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2015/02/famous-speech-friday-lupita-nyongo-on.html">Lupita Nyong'o keynoted a 2015 women's conference</a></b> and talked about following her fears--including a fear of giving that very keynote. The speech demonstrates just what you can accomplish when you follow her lead.</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2015/01/famous-speech-friday-viola-davis.html">Viola Davis's "Everything should be spoken,"</a></b> another 2015 awards acceptance speech, advocated that we should be speaking about "the unspeakable" and normalizing it.</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2016/02/famous-speech-friday-queen-latifahs.html">Queen Latifah used her 2016 Screen Actors Guild award acceptance</a></b> to encourage others who don't fit society's lens to define themselves and "keep fighting for it" in a short, strong speech which also saw her use her award statuette as a barbell, briefly.</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2016/05/famous-speech-friday-nancy-hanks-on.html">Nancy Hanks on the student she expelled</a></b> was a tale told to a convention of educators, a tale of unconscious bias and second chances.</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2016/07/famous-speech-friday-michelle-obamas.html">Michelle Obama's 2016 Democratic convention speech</a></b>, in which she referred to the White House as "a house built by slaves," contained many lines quoted again and again, including, "When they go low, we go high."</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2016/07/famous-speech-friday-beyonces-speech-on.html">Beyoncé's speech on racism and fashion</a> </b>schooled the fashion designers awarding her "icon" status with the story of why her family made her performance outfits: Because every design house had turned down the opportunity.</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2016/10/famous-speech-friday-michelle-obamas.html">Michelle Obama's "enough is enough" speech on misogyny</a></b> was among the most electric speeches given in the 2016 presidential campaign. She said out loud things that women experience every day.</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/01/famous-speech-friday-viola-daviss.html">Viola Davis's introduction of Meryl Streep at the 2017 Golden Globe Awards</a></b> ceremony was like a five-minute TED talk: Direct, funny, thoughtful, and not your usual introduction fare. Well worth a study.</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/03/famous-speech-friday-viola-davis.html">Viola Davis accepts an historic Oscar:</a> </b>She talked about storytelling, gave you a good example of how to thank people, and did it so well the host joked she should get an Emmy Award for the speech.</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/04/famous-speech-friday-gwen-ifill-on.html">Gwen Ifill on policy, politics, and leadership</a></b> is just one more example of why we miss this journalist, who died too soon. </span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/10/famous-speech-friday-rep-maxine-waterss.html">Rep. Maxine Waters's "reclaiming my time"</a></b> became a part of the vocabulary women need to develop in discourse--and a rallying cry.</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;"><b><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/12/famous-speech-friday-kamala-harriss.html">Sen. Kamala Harris's silenced Senate questions</a></b> was a particularly egregious example of interruption and attempts to silence women, handled well by the new Senator.</span></li>
</ol>
<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-7438196039355249392018-02-01T05:14:00.000-05:002018-02-01T05:14:13.823-05:00Let a doctor (and frequent speaker) explain why you need a coach<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-t2MZsbl6iWk/WkpMr53RgBI/AAAAAAAASU0/1W38kEfNEnAJlGoD0z8Eqh1ChYAJYvBdgCLcBGAs/s1600/kareem.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="330" height="320" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-t2MZsbl6iWk/WkpMr53RgBI/AAAAAAAASU0/1W38kEfNEnAJlGoD0z8Eqh1ChYAJYvBdgCLcBGAs/s320/kareem.jpg" width="211" /></a></div>
There's a great recent TED talk from physician, bestselling author, and frequent speaker Atul Gawande that makes a great case for getting a coach--and in the process of giving this talk, Gawande tackles directly a barrier I face when working with highly trained individuals: They think they've been taught everything they need to know to figure out on their own what they need to know.<br />
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In other words, they react poorly to the idea they need to be coached or taught new skills, particularly the ones they diminish by calling them "soft" skills. You know, like public speaking. Trouble is, few of them have ever learned the skills involved in public presentations and speechmaking.<br />
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As a physician, Gawande notes in his talk, he and his colleagues have been taught that "A professional is someone who is capable of managing their own improvement." But, he, notes, "Now, the contrasting view comes out of sports. And they say "You are never done, everybody needs a coach." Everyone. The greatest in the world needs a coach."<br />
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After thinking about his own work as a surgeon, Gawande concluded, "Turns out there are numerous problems in making it on your own. You don't recognize the issues that are standing in your way or if you do, you don't necessarily know how to fix them. And the result is that somewhere along the way, you stop improving." So he got a coach--a surgeon-as-coach. And he offers numerous other examples, from medicine and other fields, of situations that went well (or not) when coaching was applied (or not).<br />
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As a coach myself, I often reach for lessons from other coaches in many fields. That's why I'm reading basketball great Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's memoir, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Coach-Wooden-Me-50-Year-Friendship-ebook/dp/B01LYJI4UO/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1514818515&sr=8-2&_encoding=UTF8&tag=theelowom-20&linkCode=ur2&linkId=89f21fcec6684f8e984f38bc74988806&camp=1789&creative=9325" target="_blank">Coach Wooden and Me: Our 50-Year Friendship On and Off the Court</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="//ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?t=theelowom-20&l=ur2&o=1" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" />. He recalls being at the White House ceremony to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom along with luminaries like Robert Redford, Bill and Melinda Gates, and Bruce Springsteen:<br />
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I looked down the line of the wonderfully successful people on either side of me and wondered if each of them had a Coach Wooden, who, to quote President Obama, "helped make me who I am." I hoped so, because without Coach, my life would have been so much less. Less joyous. Less meaningful. Less filled with love.</blockquote>
Jabbar notes that Coach Wooden focused players on the activity at hand, not the outcome. It's a great lesson for public speakers as well.<br />
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Take a look at Gawande's exploration of coaching, and if you want to improve your speaking skills, get in touch with me at eloquentwoman AT gmail DOT com. Watch the video below or <a href="https://www.ted.com/talks/atul_gawande_want_to_get_great_at_something_get_a_coach/transcript?utm_source=newsletter_daily&utm_campaign=daily&utm_medium=email&utm_content=button__2017-12-15">here</a>:<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="480" scrolling="no" src="https://embed.ted.com/talks/atul_gawande_want_to_get_great_at_something_get_a_coach" style="height: 100%; left: 0; position: absolute; top: 0; width: 100%;" width="560"></iframe></div>
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<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-86463484234994402402018-01-29T05:15:00.000-05:002018-01-29T05:15:03.290-05:00The Eloquent Woman's weekly speaker toolkit<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cYZB8rEi5EE/Wmjt_WuvnsI/AAAAAAAASXI/gW2Smh2mhH0NgmdgqweUN9wANXY6mzMbQCLcBGAs/s1600/lupita%2Bew.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1600" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cYZB8rEi5EE/Wmjt_WuvnsI/AAAAAAAASXI/gW2Smh2mhH0NgmdgqweUN9wANXY6mzMbQCLcBGAs/s320/lupita%2Bew.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">I read a lot about women and public speaking, and post my finds first on </span><a href="http://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman" style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">The Eloquent Woman on Facebook</a>. But <span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">I always collect them here for you on Mondays as well. Here's what I've been reading lately:</span><br />
<ul>
<li><b>Sexism at scale: </b>Taking a look at the largest trade show, <a href="http://mashable.com/2018/01/12/ces-is-still-sexist/#RMmIAf.xNsq8">The insidious sexism of CES is impossible to ignore</a> is a thoughtful examination of all the ways the conference discriminates against women.</li>
<li><b>What about them? </b>In <a href="https://victimfocus.wordpress.com/2018/01/03/stop-asking-me-what-about-men/">Stop asking me what about men?</a> the author finds an interesting way to do some research on this sexist trope.</li>
<li><b style="line-height: 18px;">Did you miss? </b><span style="line-height: 18px;">This week, the blog looked at a <a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2018/01/new-volume-of-talks-from-moth-focuses.html">new volume of talks from The Moth,</a> and Famous Speech Friday shared a speech by <a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2018/01/famous-speech-friday-megan-red-shirt.html">Megan Red Shirt-Shaw at a Harvard convocation</a>.</span></li>
<li><span style="line-height: 18px;"><b>A great loss: </b>The wonderful novelist Ursula K. LeGuin died last week 88. Her speech, <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2013/01/our-100th-famous-speech-friday-ursula-k.html">We Are Volcanoes</a>, was our 100th Famous Speech Friday and a rallying cry for women today who want to speak up.</span></li>
<li><b style="line-height: 18px;">About the quote:</b><span style="line-height: 18px;"> Wisdom from actor Lupita Nyong'o.</span></li>
</ul>
<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-57698210962737781352018-01-26T04:45:00.000-05:002018-01-26T04:45:01.403-05:00Famous Speech Friday: Megan Red Shirt-Shaw's convocation speech<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-mJYUYxRvUJ8/WW-f9T-QrgI/AAAAAAAAR-w/FwrdcE3-En8fLEucF2_qC1jSnsEiOI11wCLcBGAs/s1600/redshirt.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="259" data-original-width="403" height="205" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-mJYUYxRvUJ8/WW-f9T-QrgI/AAAAAAAAR-w/FwrdcE3-En8fLEucF2_qC1jSnsEiOI11wCLcBGAs/s320/redshirt.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
In May 2017, Megan Red Shirt-Shaw became one of the first Native Americans to give a convocation speech at Harvard University, speaking on behalf of her fellow students in the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Perhaps not surprisingly, given the venue, the speech garnered much attention for its passionate defense of education for all. But Red Shirt-Shaw's take on the topic is a reminder that education doesn't start, end, or remained confined within a school--even a place as prestigious as Harvard.<br />
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Red Shirt-Shaw spent her graduate years balancing study time with time as a front-line activist working with the Harvard student group Future Indigenous Educators Resisting Colonial Education (FIERCE) on urgent issues such as the Dakota Pipeline Access movement. Her convocation speech is unusual in that it highlights the way that traditional classrooms and assignments can often be the least important parts of an education. This part of the address, describing her work with a Canadian education program for indigenous girls called Moving the Mountain, is just one of the striking examples of this fact:<br />
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That day with faces like mine would remind me in my greatest lesson of the year what resilience is, unlike my own experiences. Almost every person and every system in their life has let them down, and yet they persevere, rising like fire from the ashes. Moving the mountains, unleashed in their ways. I cried in anger for the entire flight back because I knew what I was learning here in the classroom wasn't going to make the world better for them tomorrow.</blockquote>
What can you learn from this famous speech?<br />
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<li><span style="font-weight: bold;">Take advantage of an historic opportunity.</span> As one of Harvard's first Native American convocation speakers, Red Shirt-Shaw found ways to explain how her background had fueled and influenced her time at the university. The passage about how she carried the voices of her family and other native students with her, from her first day on campus, reminded me of what institutions have to gain from expanding the diversity of their student body. And one of the most popular lines from the speech passed around on social media (see below) was her mother's cherished Lakota phrase: "Weksuye, ciksuye, miksuye." ("I remember, I remember you, remember me.")</li>
<li><span style="font-weight: bold;">Reach for poetry, if it's in your grasp.</span> Red Shirt-Shaw, among her many talents, is a gifted writer and editor who founded the online publication <a href="http://nativesinamerica.com/">Natives in America </a>to highlight the work of young Native writers. I think part of the appeal of her speech is the gorgeous bits of writing in it that verge on the poetic--lines like this one: "We cannot begin to predict in the future what will be difficult, what will feel safe, who will be beautiful to us, and what will make us feel like we've come undone."</li>
<li><span style="font-weight: bold;">Keep the conversation going after your speech.</span> There are plenty of ways to make your speech resonate far beyond the time and space occupied by its original listeners. <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2013/01/why-and-how-you-should-publish-your.html">Recording and sharing video</a>, transcriptions, links to materials used in preparing your talk and following up on social media are all great options. I was touched by Red Shirt-Shaw's follow-up on Twitter as the speech gathered more online viewers, listing her hopes the speech's future impact, including the hope to "honor indigenous voices and let's move more of them onto stages everywhere, every day, all the time."<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
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Almost one week later and watching my convocation speech rise over 770,000 views today, here are my hopes:</div>
— Megan Red Shirt-Shaw (@mredshirtshaw) <a href="https://twitter.com/mredshirtshaw/status/869598771201667072">May 30, 2017</a></blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script></li>
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Here's the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jG9gHn7tHBI">full video</a> of the speech:<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="253" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/jG9gHn7tHBI" width="450"></iframe>
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<i>(Freelance writer <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=becky+ham+wordpress&oq=becky+&aqs=chrome.1.69i57j35i39j0l4.3580j0j4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8">Becky Ham</a> contributed this Famous Speech Friday post)</i><br />
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<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>Becky Hamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00924240192036928484noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-23887439823866173602018-01-25T05:15:00.000-05:002018-01-25T05:15:18.387-05:00New volume of talks from The Moth focuses on uncertainty<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-65OA1NiC2HI/Wklw48yVd-I/AAAAAAAASUk/hxzAnjAodRcJIWDzTZDMQRMca2W-ohmAwCLcBGAs/s1600/moth.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="346" data-original-width="250" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-65OA1NiC2HI/Wklw48yVd-I/AAAAAAAASUk/hxzAnjAodRcJIWDzTZDMQRMca2W-ohmAwCLcBGAs/s320/moth.jpg" width="231" /></a></div>
I received as a gift <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Moth-Presents-All-These-Wonders-ebook/dp/B01HL1CE5E/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1514762327&sr=8-1&keywords=the+moth+presents+all+these+wonders&_encoding=UTF8&tag=theelowom-20&linkCode=ur2&linkId=cefc9a9ddd4b1f4dc038c4d70349e257&camp=1789&creative=9325" target="_blank">The Moth Presents All These Wonders: True Stories About Facing the Unknown</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="//ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?t=theelowom-20&l=ur2&o=1" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" /> from a friend after a hospital stay during which the doctors couldn't yet diagnose me, so I was living in medical uncertainty. It was a well-timed choice, focused as this volume is on talks about the unknown.<br />
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And aside from being a beautifully made volume--one you will want in hardcopy even if, like me, you mostly collect ebooks--this book does something I wish we'd see more of: It collects actual scripts (or in this case transcripts) of complete talks. Talks at The Moth must be personal experiences of the speakers and they must be true, but after that, anything goes.<br />
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This is a wonderful volume for the shelf of a speechwriter, a speaker seeking to learn how to tell effective personal stories, or that good friend waiting for a diagnosis or a decision to land.<br />
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<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-40310049698937978552018-01-22T05:15:00.000-05:002018-01-22T05:15:00.207-05:00The Eloquent Woman's weekly speaker toolkit<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-3v57k-hvSCM/WWapAK-YeTI/AAAAAAAAR9U/332Ra024fhU-OVk-Qr4-pYGWdhZzcP4GgCLcBGAs/s1600/ER%2BEW%2Bquote.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1600" height="320" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-3v57k-hvSCM/WWapAK-YeTI/AAAAAAAAR9U/332Ra024fhU-OVk-Qr4-pYGWdhZzcP4GgCLcBGAs/s320/ER%2BEW%2Bquote.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">I read a lot about women and public speaking, and post my finds first on </span><a href="http://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman" style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">The Eloquent Woman on Facebook</a>. But <span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">I always collect them here for you on Mondays as well. Here's what I've been reading lately:</span><br />
<ul>
<li><span style="line-height: 18px;"><b>How to respond to harassment: </b>Recently, reader Claire Duffy made this request: "The lid has blown right off the sexual harassment issue. It’s ugly and traumatic territory. I’d like to see girls and women getting some help with negotiating this difficult topic. I am surrounded by women saying - ashamedly ‘I didn’t know how to get him to stop’ and I know several who are simply paralyzed by the inability to speak up about it - whether they’re victims, or just dealing with discussions in a social setting. It all comes back to the age old power imbalance that got you started on this blog in the first place. To that I would add the stupefying insensitivity so many men show on this matter. They just don’t get it. How can we help them? So that’s my item for the ‘to do’ list." <a href="http://www.catalyst.org/sexual-harassment">This resource page</a> </span>from <a href="https://www.facebook.com/catalystinc/?fref=mentions">Catalyst</a> is a great start with info for harrassed women, men, and employers.</li>
<li><b>A voice that resonates: </b>A wonderful look from The Library of Congress about <a href="https://blogs.loc.gov/loc/2018/01/hearing-abraham-lincolns-voice/">the little we know about Abraham Lincoln's voice.</a> I love that he was a slow speaker: "Lincoln also spoke slowly, allowing his words to be considered and understood. While this pace may have accorded with Lincoln’s own speaking style, he clearly recognized the value of a slow cadence in a public address. Unable to attend a rally in Springfield, Illinois, in 1863, he sent a letter to be read aloud on his behalf, a draft of which is in the Abraham Lincoln Papers at the Library of Congress. “You are one of the best public readers. I have but one suggestion,” Lincoln advised his political associate James C. Conkling: “Read it very slowly.” "</li>
<li><b style="line-height: 18px;">Did you miss? </b><span style="line-height: 18px;">This week, the blog looked at <a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2018/01/women-public-speaking-power-featured-in.html">Mary Beard's new book on women and power</a>, and Famous Speech Friday shared <a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2018/01/famous-speech-friday-mary-meekers-2017.html">Mary Meeker's 2017 Internet trends report</a>, a rule-breaking presentation.</span></li>
<li><b style="line-height: 18px;">About the quote: </b><span style="line-height: 18px;">Get some courage from frequent-speaking First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt.</span></li>
</ul>
<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-27162488642673921822018-01-19T04:45:00.000-05:002018-01-19T04:45:02.030-05:00Famous Speech Friday: Mary Meeker's 2017 Internet trends report<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-DrFW4JrpdGY/WW_4i_VRlrI/AAAAAAAAR_M/Wk-vE_nk8FM8ZN64dBL_acFicuxcVJkIACLcBGAs/s1600/meeker.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="425" data-original-width="642" height="211" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-DrFW4JrpdGY/WW_4i_VRlrI/AAAAAAAAR_M/Wk-vE_nk8FM8ZN64dBL_acFicuxcVJkIACLcBGAs/s320/meeker.jpg" width="320" /></a>She breaks every rule in the book with her annual presentation. She tends to wear unremarkable black. Her slide deck is enormous, with more than 300 slides for a 30-minute time slot. Her charts have too much type on them, many impossible to read from the audience. Her delivery is staccato, clipped, fast-talker fast, and often monotone.<br />
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But Mary Meeker, a venture capitalist with Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, gives what is arguably the most famous annual slide presentation in any industry. <a href="https://www.slideshare.net/kleinerperkins/internet-trends-2017-report">Her slide deck</a> this year has more than 1.8 million views on SlideShare at this writing and, unlike yours or mine, is pored over for clues and hints as to what this expert on the digital space foresees for the year ahead.<br />
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For Meeker, it is what it is. Her beginning--almost a warning to the audience--tells you this is not going to be some kind of inspiring TED talk: "This presentation is meant to be read, it's not meant to be presented, so it is online at KleinerPerkins.com and elsewhere, so please do not take notes and I apologize for the speed at which I will go through this." Her delivery is not without humor, pauses, or expressiveness, although it is a workmanlike effort to get through a lot of material.<br />
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The presentation is not as unremarkable as that sounds. In fact, it carries huge influence. For one relatively new private ad tech company, <a href="http://adage.com/article/digital/marry-meeker-puts-report/309411/">Vungle, being featured on slide 27 of Meeker's 355-slide deck</a> this year meant instant fame: "Large investors, the type that you would dream about reaching out to you, are courting you and your board," [Vungle co-founder and CEO Zain] Jaffer, 29, said. "Now I'm being asked what I would do if I had an 'extra $100 million or $200 million.'"<br />
<br />
What can you learn from this famous speech?<br />
<ul>
<li><b>Content matters:</b> Meeker's annual report is sought after because of its unique and comprehensive look at all the major internet and digital trends of the day--not just a data dump, but trenchant analysis, distilled so it makes sense. Yes, you can have a 355-page distillation. On occasion. This presentation is eagerly awaited each year for the content, which is stellar. It adds value. Don't let anyone tell you your content doesn't matter. It does.</li>
<li><b>If you're going to buck the rules, explain how: </b>Meeker's early disclaimer that the slides are not meant to be presented is there for a reason: To be sure her audiences (those in front of her and the virtual gang) understand her intention. But it's a useful reminder for speakers: Your slides are not the be-all end-all of your presentation.</li>
<li><b>Throw me a sparse summary to keep my understanding high:</b> Throughout the deck, you'll see nearly blank slides with just a few words of summary highlighting and summarizing the trend data she's discussing. "Ad Growth = Driven by Mobile" is one example. Those short markers ensure her audience can follow along and get the gist of what the longer, more complex data slides will back up in later reading.</li>
</ul>
<div>
This isn't necessarily a format to emulate, but one to marvel at in the hands of a master. I follow Meeker's report every year, and learn much from it. You can see the <a href="https://www.slideshare.net/kleinerperkins/internet-trends-2017-report">full slide deck here</a>, and watch the entire talk in the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UC8GwG6srqs">video here</a> or below:</div>
<i><br /></i><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="253" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/UC8GwG6srqs" width="450"></iframe>
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<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-17296530496002716602018-01-18T05:15:00.000-05:002018-01-18T05:15:17.970-05:00"Find your voice and use it:" New book encourages women speakers<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-TJXdT4l_2hI/WkgHjeYuuOI/AAAAAAAASTo/wOo-5mg2ON8Hry36keO5jQZgdUvM5PVngCLcBGAs/s1600/beardbook.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="499" data-original-width="308" height="320" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-TJXdT4l_2hI/WkgHjeYuuOI/AAAAAAAASTo/wOo-5mg2ON8Hry36keO5jQZgdUvM5PVngCLcBGAs/s320/beardbook.jpg" width="197" /></a></div>
A British writer gave two powerful lectures on women and their right to express themselves, and they were published as a book that went on to be a manifesto for women's right to an independent voice that had a huge impact on women for decades. I'm referring, of course, to <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2011/03/famous-speech-friday-virginia-woolfs.html">the lectures that became Virginia Woolf's masterpiece A Room of One's Own</a>. But there is a new manifesto out, one that also combines two lectures with an equal power to inspire women on public speaking and the power that comes with it.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.amazon.com/b?_encoding=UTF8&tag=theelowom-20&linkCode=ur2&linkId=fb7e7442a85d5100f234144844801b9e&camp=1789&creative=9325&node=283155" target="_blank">Women and Power A Manifesto</a><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="//ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?t=theelowom-20&l=ur2&o=1" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" /> combines two lectures by British classics scholar Mary Beard. If you want a preview, we covered both of these lectures in our Famous Speech Friday series, with the <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/03/famous-speech-friday-mary-beard-on.html">lecture on women and power here</a>, and the <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2014/03/famous-speech-friday-mary-beard-on.html">lecture on the public voice of women here</a>. So many women don't realize that today's issues in public speaking for women are not just issues of today, but endless repetitions that stem from ancient times. And since ancient times are Beard's specialty, she takes the time to show us the impact that patriarchy has had on women's voices and power for centuries. I should note that the same historical record has been available to male historians all this time all this time, and yet we rarely read about the systemic ways in which women's voices have been silenced throughout history. For that reason alone, this book is a must-read.<br />
<br />
Beard isn't just influenced by history. As a female academic, she sees the gender disparities on conference programs, and is trolled unmercifully online by those who disagree with her feminist views. Her work is well-informed by today's challenges, and her advice is simple: "Find your voice and use it.". I hope you'll take the time to read this important work.<br />
<i>,</i><br />
<i>Get involved with more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-39112616360790926852018-01-15T05:15:00.000-05:002018-01-15T05:15:15.626-05:00The Eloquent Woman's weekly speaker toolkit<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-WLCdWdCnl7U/WU23tmGVbaI/AAAAAAAAR1I/YXKIIKym4N8UQY-96X3-4rsoRTtk_NvCwCEwYBhgL/s1600/Angelou%2BEW%2Bquote.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1050" data-original-width="600" height="320" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-WLCdWdCnl7U/WU23tmGVbaI/AAAAAAAAR1I/YXKIIKym4N8UQY-96X3-4rsoRTtk_NvCwCEwYBhgL/s320/Angelou%2BEW%2Bquote.jpg" width="182" /></a></div>
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">I read a lot about women and public speaking, and post my finds first on </span><a href="http://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman" style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">The Eloquent Woman on Facebook</a>. But <span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">I always collect them here for you on Mondays as well. Here's what I've been reading lately:</span><br />
<ul>
<li><span style="line-height: 18px;"><b>The gift of your voice: </b>From <a href="https://www.newscientist.com/article/2141940-donate-your-voice-so-siri-doesnt-just-work-for-white-men/">Donate your voice so Siri doesn't just work for white men:</a> "Through Project Common Voice, which launched last month, Mozilla aims to collect 10,000 hours of spoken English from people with a wide range of accents." Great project for readers of The Eloquent Woman, via my clients at Mozilla!</span></li>
<li><b>Women talk more? Really?</b> Thanks for the data: "<a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/salesmen-actually-talk-more-than-saleswomen-2017-7">Gong analyzed 519,000 sales calls</a> and discovered that the average monologue of male salespeople to female buyers was significantly longer (108 seconds) than the average monologue to a man (91 seconds). In other words, men talked for longer periods of uninterrupted time when selling to women. All told, when salesmen worked with female buyers, the men did 61% of the talking."</li>
<li><b style="line-height: 18px;">Did you miss? </b><span style="line-height: 18px;">This week, the blog looked at <a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2018/01/9-ideas-to-mix-up-your-speaking-in-2018.html">9 ideas to mix up your speaking in 2018</a>, a guest post from Cate Huston, and Famous Speech Friday shared <a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2018/01/23-famous-speeches-by-women-speaking-in.html">23 famous speeches by women speaking in parliamentary assemblies.</a></span></li>
<li><b style="line-height: 18px;">About the quote:</b><span style="line-height: 18px;"> Give voice to your words, eloquent women! Wisdom from Maya Angelou.</span></li>
</ul>
<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-77938195529935004942018-01-12T04:45:00.000-05:002018-01-12T04:45:13.940-05:00Famous Speech Friday: Oprah Winfrey at the Golden Globes<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-fIJnTktzwZc/WlNpI6yfdkI/AAAAAAAASVk/NC0ER4DuFGcxUCMefio6kFxK9BMLXl2RACLcBGAs/s1600/40-oprah_winfrey_winners_stage.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="280" data-original-width="410" height="218" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-fIJnTktzwZc/WlNpI6yfdkI/AAAAAAAASVk/NC0ER4DuFGcxUCMefio6kFxK9BMLXl2RACLcBGAs/s320/40-oprah_winfrey_winners_stage.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
Oprah Winfrey--talk show host, skilled interviewer, actress, producer, director, publisher and cultural phenomenon--accepted the Cecile B. DeMille award this week at the Golden Globes award ceremony. And, in a not unexpected move, she stole the show.<br />
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The speech was part lesson, part clarion call, and wholly a song--lyrical, gripping, something the crowd could join in on. I'd say kudos to the speechwriter, but suspect it was Winfrey herself, so naturally it flowed.<br />
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She started and ended the speech with little girls and the influence that can be had upon them:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
In 1964, I was a little girl sitting on the linoleum floor of my mother's house in Milwaukee watching Anne Bancroft present the Oscar for best actor at the 36th Academy Awards. She opened the envelope and said five words that literally made history: "The winner is Sidney Poitier." Up to the stage came the most elegant man I had ever seen. I remember his tie was white, and of course his skin was black, and I had never seen a black man being celebrated like that. I tried many, many times to explain what a moment like that means to a little girl, a kid watching from the cheap seats as my mom came through the door bone tired from cleaning other people's houses....In 1982, Sidney received the Cecil B. DeMille award right here at the Golden Globes and it is not lost on me that at this moment, there are some little girls watching as I become the first black woman to be given this same award. </blockquote>
Don't get the wrong idea: Oprah spent the fewest words in this speech about herself. She talked instead about women's stories:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
And I'm especially proud and inspired by all the women who have felt strong enough and empowered enough to speak up and share their personal stories. Each of us in this room are celebrated because of the stories that we tell, and this year we became the story.<br />
But it's not just a story affecting the entertainment industry. It's one that transcends any culture, geography, race, religion, politics, or workplace. So I want tonight to express gratitude to all the women who have endured years of abuse and assault because they, like my mother, had children to feed and bills to pay and dreams to pursue. They're the women whose names we'll never know. They are domestic workers and farm workers. They are working in factories and they work in restaurants and they're in academia, engineering, medicine, and science. They're part of the world of tech and politics and business. They're our athletes in the Olympics and they're our soldiers in the military.</blockquote>
Even public speaking got its due: "Speaking your truth is the most powerful tool we all have. For too long, women have not been heard or believed if they dared speak their truth to the power of those men...but their time is up."<br />
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The speech was followed by a flood of tweets calling on Oprah to run for president. Of course, we need more than one great speech to choose a president, in my view, but it says a lot about the leadership the audience heard and felt in this speech. And, <a href="https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/01/people-are-completely-missing-the-point-of-oprahs-amazing-golden-globes-speech.html">as this piece points out</a>, she wrote the speech to be about the unseen people, not about her supposed candidacy. Part celebratory romp, part history lesson, she drew all the threads of the evening's protests about sexual harassment together and made them poetic. What can you learn from this famous speech?<br />
<ul>
<li><b> Be ready for your big moment</b>. Do I have to say this? I do. Many the honoree approaches the mic unprepared, which disrespects the award and the audience. Instead, you can do as Oprah did, and use the platform to further a cause and inspire those you hope to enlist in it.</li>
<li><b>Use symmetry: </b>Oprah began with the image of herself as a little girl, watching the ceremony, and ended with a call to action for "all the girls watching here and now." Aside from the satisfaction of hearing a speech come full circle, the tactic drew Oprah closer to her audiences--the one in the room and the one watching at home. It's something at which she is a master.</li>
<li><b>Use slogans deftly and without sounding trite:</b> "Me Too" and "Time's Up" were the slogans of the night, and they are scattered sparely in her speech in ways that make it seem as if they belong right there. The impact was greater as a result.</li>
</ul>
You can <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/07/movies/oprah-winfrey-golden-globes-speech-transcript.html?_r=0">read the speech here</a> and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fN5HV79_8B8">watch it here</a> or below:<br />
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<i>(Photo: Hollywood Foreign Press)</i><br />
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<iframe allow="encrypted-media" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" gesture="media" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/fN5HV79_8B8" width="560"></iframe>
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<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-34753305140923647952018-01-11T05:15:00.000-05:002018-01-11T05:15:10.178-05:009 ideas to mix up your speaking in 2018<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-lo0vXhJrxGE/WkeY-q-LXsI/AAAAAAAASTY/XDvehXs7rLo7T3-XRXmwKt8-TfcH5BWaACLcBGAs/s1600/3289623654_7897fcb8bb_z.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="640" height="240" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-lo0vXhJrxGE/WkeY-q-LXsI/AAAAAAAASTY/XDvehXs7rLo7T3-XRXmwKt8-TfcH5BWaACLcBGAs/s320/3289623654_7897fcb8bb_z.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<i>(Editor' s note: Reader and client <a href="https://cate.blog/">Cate Huston</a>-- an engineer, frequent speaker, and enthusiastic booster of getting more women in tech to speak-- offered this guest post sharing ways to switch it up when preparing talks as inspiration for you early in the new year. Thanks, Cate!)</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
Public speaking is scary, so it’s easy to get set in what we know works. This year, challenge yourself to mix it up! Not everything will work, but that’s okay - if we don’t try, we never know.<br />
<br />
<ol>
<li><b>Slides.</b> Mix up your slide style! Try a totally different format, work with someone else to create them, or go without. </li>
<li><b>Format</b>. Is your sweet spot 20 minutes? Challenge yourself to a 40 minute slot. Do you always rely on having a lot of time? See if you can give as good a talk in 20 minutes - or 5. Run a workshop! Co-present! Or try something like Pecha Kucha or Ignite - the 5 minutes and auto-advance can be really tough!</li>
<li><b>Role.</b> Always the panelist, never the moderator? This could be the year. If you’ve never done it before, look for the opportunity to host or MC - it’s a very different experience.</li>
<li><b>Topic.</b> Maybe you’ve been giving “soft” talks - why not get really technical? Maybe technical talks seem safer, but why not challenge yourself to go beyond details - give a high level overview, or talk about a different interest or part of your role.</li>
<li><b>Audience. </b>Maybe you always talk at mobile, or PHP events - branch out and find a new audience at an event with a different theme! Maybe you present a lot internally - branch out and give a talk outside.</li>
<li><b>Preparation style.</b> Do you have a series of rituals when it comes to preparing a talk? A process involving sticky notes and weeks of preparation? Challenge yourself with a compressed timeframe or different approach (blog posts?) If finishing slides on the plane is part of your MO, challenge yourself to slide-freeze a week in advance. Things like a practise run at your company or a local meetup can force you out of the last minute preparation trap.</li>
<li><b>Medium.</b> Be a guest on a podcast (great way to extemporaneous speaking!), or record something straight to video (my video tip is this: practise without recording until you’re comfortable, then record when you’re ready. This has taken me from 20+ takes to 2). Speaking doesn’t just mean from stage.</li>
<li><b>Constraints.</b> You don’t have to agree to everything - decide what’s important to you and prioritize that - embrace constraints. Or, evaluate your internal constraints, if your gremlin is saying things like “I’m not ready to give an international talk”, you don’t have to listen to it!</li>
<li><b>Social media.</b> Schedule live tweets during your talk, or tweet teaser snippets of your prep. Turn your talk into a blog post, or use blog posts to build it up. There’s so many ways to blend your IRL talk with your digital presence.</li>
</ol>
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<i>(Creative Commons licensed photo by <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/piratealice/3289623654/in/photolist-61Gbvd-b7tR8Z-F7rxF-pdphuM-6P1PKa-74p3sr-6fSSyE-4KGT6-akvJrY-dP6LeN-jECNex-8oqsK-EksTp-61Wwyv-isdkii-fMJhjr-nvGWAU-nkrkEc-2vVkpu-Hwgs47-8BHh39-3e31z8-7zEt9H-pdgTw8-543bvX-yHGV-netX5h-WdZMwZ-oaf4Z9-nvGZw3-akvJxS-9LPBnH-Curwec-jeDHRe-8LHXQU-5UNBT6-r3jMs-pejy4n-6pnYw5-gC2Nh-a82LYY-aapteD-fMJnPH-ohynbV-4w2F29-8RQ5s2-qLfhrx-6AsS4N-6HKwV6-bLEZ1r">Patti</a>)</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-53995859382132275182018-01-08T05:15:00.000-05:002018-01-08T05:15:00.250-05:00The Eloquent Woman's weekly speaker toolkit<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-bClZqF0Tyqo/WVozXRreLLI/AAAAAAAAR6g/LYSQ3ThqsnAzP-OPF3GOIoViNFmauuTIwCLcBGAs/s1600/Angelou%2B2%2BEW%2Bquote.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1143" data-original-width="1600" height="228" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-bClZqF0Tyqo/WVozXRreLLI/AAAAAAAAR6g/LYSQ3ThqsnAzP-OPF3GOIoViNFmauuTIwCLcBGAs/s320/Angelou%2B2%2BEW%2Bquote.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">I read a lot about women and public speaking, and post my finds first on </span><a href="http://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman" style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">The Eloquent Woman on Facebook</a>. But <span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">I always collect them h ere for you on Mondays as well. Here's what I've been reading lately:</span><br />
<ul>
<li><span style="line-height: 18px;"><b>Times two: </b>A <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/28/opinion/sunday/patriarchy-feminism-metoo.html">must-read from Susan Faludi</a>, about the two ways women protest, and how they need to come together for real progress to be made..</span></li>
<li><span style="line-height: 18px;"><b>Use that mic! </b>After proposed sessions about harassment were rejected, and complaints were not addressed, a woman speaker used part of her presentation on another topic to <a href="https://www.gizmodo.com.au/2017/12/major-hacker-conference-organizers-accused-of-ignoring-harassment-enabling-abusers/">call out the conference</a> for not protecting women attendees.</span></li>
<li><b style="line-height: 18px;">Did you miss? </b><span style="line-height: 18px;">This week, the blog looked at <a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2018/01/whats-outlook-for-women-and-public.html">the outlook for women and public speaking in 2018</a>, and Famous Speech Friday shared a guest post by Imogen Morley on <a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2018/01/famous-speech-friday-dolores-ibarruris.html">Dolores Ibárruri's 1939 speech ‘¡No Pasarán!’</a>.</span></li>
<li><b style="line-height: 18px;">About the quote:</b><span style="line-height: 18px;"> Wisdom and encouragement from the great Maya Angelou.</span></li>
</ul>
<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-18860743236036143392018-01-05T04:45:00.000-05:002018-01-05T04:45:01.410-05:00Famous Speech Friday: Dolores Ibárruri's 1939 speech ‘¡No Pasarán!’<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="color: #555555;"><i>(Editor's note: I found this famous speech covered at length on <a href="https://imogenmorley.wordpress.com/">the blog of Imogen Morley</a>, who writes about diplomatic relations and diplomacy, communications in the digital age, and speechwriting, and this post about a short but powerful radio address in Spain in the late 1930s combines a bit of all three subjects. It echoes the power of another of our Famous Speech Friday posts about</i></span><span style="background-color: transparent;"><span style="color: #555555;"><i> <a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2012/03/famous-speech-friday-evitas.html">Evita Peron's 1951 Renunciamiento</a>, another great example of using radio for rhetorical success. And while this post differs from our usual FSF format, it's a fascinating take on a speech that caused a sensation. <a href="https://imogenmorley.wordpress.com/2017/08/20/anatomy-of-a-speech-no-pasaran-dolores-ibarruri/">It's reprinted here</a> with Morley's permission.</i></span></span></div>
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<i style="color: #555555;">Morley published the post back in August 2017 with this introduction: </i><span style="color: #555555;">"</span><span style="color: #555555; font-family: inherit;">Something a bit different for this post. Last week in Charlottesville, Virginia, </span><a href="https://www.economist.com/news/obituary/21726701-legal-assistant-killed-far-right-rally-charlottesville-was-32-obituary-heather" style="color: #dd5424; font-family: inherit; text-decoration-line: none;">Heather Heyer</a><span style="color: #555555; font-family: inherit;"> died peacefully protesting against the kind of hateful and violent nationalism that should have long ago been consigned to history. Although this speech is from a very different time and context, I thought that highlighting the powerful words of another woman from another generation would be some small tribute to those who still stand up for democracy, freedom and human dignity. </span><span style="color: #555555; font-family: inherit;">In recent days, ‘No Pasarán’ has been appearing on Twitter in response to the Barcelona terrorist attack. </span><span style="color: #555555; font-family: inherit;">As this speech is very short – a battle cry, really – the analysis is also quite short. But it’s a fascinating speech from a fascinating woman who deserves to be more well known." <i>Enjoy this guest Famous Speech Friday!)</i></span></div>
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<strong><em><span style="font-family: inherit;">La Pasionaria</span></em></strong></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Dolores-Ibarruri" rel="noopener" style="color: #dd5424; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Dolores Ibárruri</a> was a Spanish communist politician and republican heroine of the Spanish Civil War. She was a force of nature: she had a fierce intellect and was considered a brilliant speaker. Her struggle against both the misogyny and poverty she grew up in, her willingness to speak up for the rights of women and workers, and her fearless protests against Franco and fascism, make her a heroine for all women wanting to find their own voice in the world.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Ibárruri was born in 1895 into family of miners in the Basque region of Spain, the eighth of eleven children. Despite showing a strong desire to learn – she later said she read anything she could lay her hands on – she left school at fifteen and worked as a seamstress, and later as a maid. At the age of twenty, she married Julián Ruiz, a miner and communist. In 1917, she became a member of Spanish Social Workers’ Party, and in 1921 a member of the Communist Party. Using the pseudonym <em>La Pasionaria</em>, she began writing articles for a miners’ newspaper and became active in the workers’ movement. She later separated from her husband and moved to Madrid. In 1930, she was voted onto the Central Committee of the Spanish Communist Party and was responsible for the party’s Women’s’ Commission. In the early 1930s, she became renowned for her brilliant and rousing speeches. As a member of the <em>Cortes Generales</em> (‘General Courts’ – the Spanish Parliament), she fought for women’s rights, especially in the areas of work and health.</span></div>
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<strong><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Speech</span></strong></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">This speech was broadcast on Radio Madrid on 19th July 1939, as part of wider efforts to rally the citizens of Madrid against Franco’s nationalists, who were preparing to launch a military offensive on the city. The Communist Party knew that Ibárruri was a popular and persuasive figure. Her fiery and naturalistic style of delivery was perfectly suited to the moment. The battle cry, ‘<em>¡No Pasarán!’</em> (‘They shall not pass’) quickly became a slogan for all those fighting against Franco’s fascist troops and is still used by activists in other contexts today. Ibárruri used it as the title for her autobiography, published in 1966. <a href="http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2012/08/17/158976733/coming-up-women-in-russian-punk-band-to-be-sentenced" style="color: #dd5424; text-decoration-line: none;">Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, a member of Pussy Riot, even wore the slogan on a t-shirt during her trial in Russia.</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">At first, the speech gained little attention in the foreign press, despite being very popular in Spain itself. Slowly, however, foreign journalists started taking notice of Ibárruri and her speeches. In August 1936, the French writer Élie Faure, in an article for <em>Regards </em>magazine, describes watching Ibárruri giving a speech, saying he’d ‘never seen or heard anything like it’. Though she came from a family of miners, she was ‘aristocratic through and through’.</span></div>
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<strong><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Battle Cry to an Invisible Audience</span></strong></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">It goes without saying that giving a speech on the radio is completely different to giving a speech in front of an audience. The audience will probably be larger, but they will either be alone or in small groups. And the point of this speech was to rally <em>all</em> the citizens of Madrid, not just left-wing fighters. How to find a battle cry for such an (invisible) audience? Ibárruri fosters a sense of kinship amongst her audience in three ways. Firstly, she binds all the differing political and social groups together, as Spanish citizens ‘loyal to the Republic’. For Spain’s future, they must all struggle together. Their identity as Spaniards, as ‘workers and farmers’, indeed ‘the people’, is more important than their individual identities. She urges them all to ‘stay true to the republican state and fight side by side with the workers, with the forces of the Popular Front, with your parents, your siblings and comrades’, here linking the kinship of a family with the kinship of a nation.’ Secondly, she turns the focus of the struggle onto those they are fighting against. They are ‘enemies of the republic’ and therefore enemies of all Spaniards. This creates a sense of kinship by setting all those ‘loyal’ to Spain, regardless of background, against those who wish to destroy it. And thirdly, she creates a sense of kinship amongst her audience by making them Spain itself. ‘All of Spain presents itself for battle’ she says. Unless the citizens act together, there will be no Spain, because Spain <em>is </em>its citizens.</span></div>
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<strong><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Historical Moment</span></strong></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Ibárruri also places her speech and Spain’s struggle in the historical moment. ‘The people,’ she says, ‘understand the graveness of this moment’. The very future of Spain demands that citizens fight the nationalist forces. Notice that she does not urge people to understand the importance of the moment. They already understand how critical this struggle is: the ‘workers and farmers from all Spanish provinces are joining in the struggle’<em>. </em>Her speech contributes to a wider momentum. She refers twice to the violence in Asturias in 1934, when left-wing miners were attacked by troops from the local ruling right-wing party. First, she urges the women of Spain to ‘recall the heroism of the women of Asturias of 1934 and struggle alongside the men to defend the lives and freedom of your sons, overshadowed by the fascist menace’. Secondly, the nationalists are ‘the hangmen of October’. She persuades her audience that their actions are necessary by reminding them of the violence of their enemy. They are ‘the fascist foe, who drag through the mud the very same honourable military tradition that they have boasted to possess so many times’. They are not worthy of a place in Spain’s future. This local reference not only places this struggle in its political context, but also highlights Ibárruri’s own mining background. By making her speech and its message part of Spain’s historical narrative, she makes it part of history: a moment when which the Spanish people must stand up and play their part.</span></div>
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<strong><em><span style="font-family: inherit;">¡No Pasarán!</span></em></strong></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Screen Shot 2017-08-20 at 09.21.18" class="wp-image-1385 aligncenter" data-attachment-id="1385" data-comments-opened="1" data-image-description="" data-image-meta="{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"","orientation":"0"}" data-image-title="Screen Shot 2017-08-20 at 09.21.18" data-large-file="https://imogenmorley.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/screen-shot-2017-08-20-at-09-21-18.png?w=356&h=199?w=423" data-medium-file="https://imogenmorley.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/screen-shot-2017-08-20-at-09-21-18.png?w=356&h=199?w=300" data-orig-file="https://imogenmorley.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/screen-shot-2017-08-20-at-09-21-18.png?w=356&h=199" data-orig-size="423,237" data-permalink="https://imogenmorley.wordpress.com/2017/08/20/anatomy-of-a-speech-no-pasaran-dolores-ibarruri/screen-shot-2017-08-20-at-09-21-18/" height="199" sizes="(max-width: 356px) 100vw, 356px" src="https://imogenmorley.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/screen-shot-2017-08-20-at-09-21-18.png?w=356&h=199" srcset="https://imogenmorley.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/screen-shot-2017-08-20-at-09-21-18.png?w=356&h=199 356w, https://imogenmorley.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/screen-shot-2017-08-20-at-09-21-18.png?w=150&h=84 150w, https://imogenmorley.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/screen-shot-2017-08-20-at-09-21-18.png?w=300&h=168 300w, https://imogenmorley.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/screen-shot-2017-08-20-at-09-21-18.png 423w" style="border: 1px solid rgb(229, 229, 229); display: block; height: auto; margin-bottom: 1.69231em !important; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px !important; max-width: 100%; padding: 1px; vertical-align: middle;" width="356" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">Contemporary Spanish right-wing poster (from ‘Große Reden – No Pasarán’ documentary)</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">This battle cry was originally used at the Battle of Verdun (1916) by the French military. So, by using these specific words, Ibárruri is (perhaps unintentionally) placing the struggle against Franco’s nationalists in the wider European historical and geographical narrative. But there’s another and more important reason Ibárruri used this phrase. It had recently appeared on right-wing posters in Spain. By using the phrase, Ibárruri turns her enemies’ own words against them.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Ibárruri uses the phrase three times in this short speech.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Firstly:</span></div>
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<em><span style="font-family: inherit;">Under the battle cry ‘Fascism shall not pass; the hangmen of October shall not pass!’ workers and farmers from all Spanish provinces are joining in the struggle against the enemies of the Republic that have arisen in arms.</span></em></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Ibárruri leaves her audience in no doubt what they ‘shall not pass’ means: it is a ‘battle cry’ for the violent ‘struggle’ against both the nationalist forces and the very idea of fascism itself. Note how she refers to ‘workers and farmers’, specific groups of people, rather than just an abstract image of Spanish citizens. She calls on her audience to participate actively in the struggle, not to simply support those who are fighting.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Secondly:</span></div>
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<em><span style="font-family: inherit;">The whole country cringes in indignation at these heartless barbarians that would hurl our democratic Spain back down into an abyss of terror and death. However, THEY SHALL NOT PASS! For all of Spain presents itself for battle. </span></em></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Now ‘the whole country’, ‘all of Spain’ will not let the ‘heartless barbarians’ pass. Here Ibárruri reiterates the historical importance of this moment – the fascists who would ‘hurl our democratic Spain back down into an abyss of terror and death’. Note how she says ‘our Spain’. The nationalists are ‘barbarians’, not worthy of being called Spanish. As barbarians, they are enemies of civilization itself. And after creating an image of Spain made up of her citizens, the violent language of hurling the country ‘back down into an abyss’, the very earth – ‘mud’ – itself, serves to embody the threat, both to the lives of Spanish citizens and to Spain itself.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Thirdly:</span></div>
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<em><span style="font-family: inherit;">Long live the Popular Front! Long live the union of all anti-fascists! Long live the Republic of the people! The Fascists shall not pass! THEY SHALL NOT PASS!</span></em></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">She ends with a rhetorical three-part list, each time increasing the size of the group, building up from small specific group ‘the Popular Front’, to ‘all anti-fascists’, to the ‘Republic of the people’. This ending mirrors the beginning of her speech and its call for all Spaniards to unite in the struggle. The Spanish people will stand shoulder to shoulder and the fascists ‘shall not pass’.</span></div>
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<strong><span style="font-family: inherit;">Aftermath</span></strong></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Despite the mobilisation of Madrid’s citizens, Franco’s nationalists besieged the city in October 1936, whicheventually fell on 28th March 1939. Francoist propaganda made fun of Ibárruri’s famous battle cry, writing songs about how ‘No Pasarán’ was no longer true. But these songs have not survived the test of history. What have survived are Ibárruri’s words: a battle cry for freedom, for democracy and for the defeat of fascism.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Ibárruri left Spain in 1939, eventually gaining asylum in the USSR. She remained active in left-wing politics, working for the Spanish Communist Party in exile and writing article and books. She returned to Spain in 1977 at the age of 80 and became active in Spanish politics until her death in 1989.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">She was, at times, a divisive figure. She was a lifelong committed Stalinist and often critical of other left-wing organisations. But today she is almost exclusively remembered as a symbol for the resistance to Franco’s fascism. She was, unmistakably, a remarkable woman who endured great personal loss. Four of her six children died young, apparently due to the family’s extreme poverty; her surviving son died during the Second World War. She fought for women’s rights in both the home and at work. She was a fearless and heartfelt public speaker, as well as a fiercely intelligent politician, at a time when women were almost universally barred from politics. She fought for freedom and democracy, for the rights of all citizens and for a better life. If she were alive today, she would surely be standing shoulder to shoulder with those still fighting (and dying) for human freedom and dignity.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><em>The full text of the speech in Spanish is </em><a href="https://www.marxists.org/espanol/ibarruri/1936/jul/19.htm" style="color: #dd5424; text-decoration-line: none;"><em>available here</em></a><em>. The English translation I have used is </em><a href="https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/No_Pasaran#cite_note-test-1" style="color: #dd5424; text-decoration-line: none;"><em>available here</em></a><em>. A German translation is </em><a href="http://lesgrandsdiscours.arte.tv/de/no-pasaran-dolores-ibarruri" style="color: #dd5424; text-decoration-line: none;"><em>available here</em></a><em>.</em></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><em>(</em><em style="text-align: center;">Dolores Ibárruri in 1936 – photo by Mikhail Koltsov via </em><a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3A%D0%94%D0%BE%D0%BB%D0%BE%D1%80%D0%B5%D1%81_%D0%98%D0%B1%D0%B0%D1%80%D1%80%D1%83%D1%80%D0%B8.JPG" style="color: #dd5424; text-align: center; text-decoration-line: none;"><em>WikiCommons</em></a><em style="text-align: center;">)</em></span></div>
<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-60424429326368420592018-01-04T05:15:00.000-05:002018-01-04T05:15:00.204-05:00What's the outlook for women and public speaking in 2018?<div class="separator" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;">
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The world seems all chaos at times, these days, and we're hearing more all the time about manels and manterruptions, women being systematically denied turns to speak in conferences or Congress, harassment of women speakers, and stultifying speaking conditions that would drive any woman to decline an invitation to speak. Some days, the view for women and public speaking can seem pretty bleak.<br />
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But in fact, all those things are signals that change is afoot. Backlash can be seen as a sign that your speaking is actually effective, and hitting its mark. Throughout history, over and over again, we've seen periods when women were largely forbidden to speak in public--most of history, in long stretches--interrupted when war and economic chaos shook things up and prompted change in women's ability and opportunity to break those norms and come out speaking in public. There's a good discussion of that phenomenon here in <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/02/scheidel-great-leveler-inequality-violence/517164/">The only thing, historically, that's curbed inequality: Catastrophe</a>, to get you started thinking about it.<br />
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I believe we are in such a time, and catastrophic times do benefit women speakers, opening up new opportunities and reasons for them to lift their voices in protest, in leadership, and more. And these types of events are in fact cyclical. It is not a mistake, historians tell me, that this is happening 100 years, roughly, after the British and American suffragists sought and won votes for some women, an effort that not only opened up opportunities for women's public speech, but depended on it as a strategic tactic. Not a mistake.<br />
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Today, that translates into more frequent, more public, and easier conversations around issues women face in public speaking, a pre-condition for being able to speak more readily and to address issues and bring them forward. But it also means more chances to speak, more reasons to speak, more opportunities to speak.<br />
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So the question in 2018 for women who speak in public is: How will you use this moment? The fulcrum of history, the pivot point, is here. That's not to say that all the barriers are removed, but the conditions are ripe to make some progress. Here are some ideas for how you can make the most of this historic moment while advancing yourself as a speaker:<br />
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<li><b>What should you be speaking up about right now?</b> It doesn't have to be at a protest rally, it could just be in a workplace meeting. Conditions are good for you not only to try more speaking up, but to be able to point out things like manterruptions or others taking credit for your work--because part of the foment is that we are discussing such phenomena more and more, making it okay to say. So now you have the luxury of asking yourself: What should I be saying now that will make a difference?</li>
<li><b>How can you use this moment to build more speaking opportunities? </b>When catastrophe cracks society open, opportunity is created. Ask whether you can keynote this time, or get off the panel and speak as an individual. Try that TEDx talk. Find or create more chances for yourself to speak while the opportunities are expanding. Seize this speaking day. Start a women's speaking forum at your workplace, or in your community. Try new-to-you speaking styles and venues. Put yourself out there.</li>
<li><b>Build skills and reputation:</b> Strike while the iron is hot, as they used to say, and use this moment to develop speaking skills you don't have now. Seek speaking opportunities so you can build a reputation as a good speaker--that will last long after the foment. Be sure to document your speaking: Create a speaker page that lists your engagements, publish video or audio of your talks, publish the text of your talks and your slides, share any social buzz, stay in contact with conference organizers and make it easier for then to find and choose you.</li>
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I wish you a 2018 full of speaking up about what's meaningful to you, and thank you for coming here for your ideas, info, and inspiration as you do so. Happy new year!<br />
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<i>(Creative Commons licensed photo by <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/127315143@N05/15713066442/in/photolist-pWvzdE-oZDVVX-p1Q3bC-pE3FtR-pWxPqy-pE2uoh-pUhHfU-pFbFA4-pVxPqJ-pFfUEG-pVvTwd-pWxPCY-pXDnfH-pWdwZe-pWwjeQ-pDXDFp-pFdxxg-pUjeNL-pFhfVD-de4gM7-pWxQ6G-pE2u9j-pE1psM-pWvzqU-oZFrVK-pFdxja-pE3aHw-pFfUKS-p1RUGL-pXtvsF-pWojfk-p1UNAa-pE3G5k-pUje63-pFh2LL-pWf4s6-pDXDAV-pVvTq1-pE5rrS-pFfUVm-de4hAa-pFdzNP-pPntAG-de4gE7-p1RV6b-pFdxpF-pFhdCx-pXMh9w-p1Q367-dvXAFR">TEDxNY</a>)</i><br />
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<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-61622561322785671632018-01-01T05:15:00.000-05:002018-01-01T12:52:55.892-05:00The Eloquent Woman's weekly speaker toolkit<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-dTLevK_JN-g/WVkx1RR9jSI/AAAAAAAAR6E/bsyHU_p8uoMofkxEfykwSlq5iBZ7xUsEgCLcBGAs/s1600/Ensler%2BEW%2Bquote.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-dTLevK_JN-g/WVkx1RR9jSI/AAAAAAAAR6E/bsyHU_p8uoMofkxEfykwSlq5iBZ7xUsEgCLcBGAs/s320/Ensler%2BEW%2Bquote.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">I read a lot about women and public speaking, and post my finds first on </span><a href="http://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman" style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">The Eloquent Woman on Facebook</a>. But <span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">I always collect them here for you on Mondays as well. Here's what I've been reading lately:</span><br />
<ul>
<li><b>We see you:</b> <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2017/12/women-are-invited-to-give-fewer-talks-than-men-at-top-us-universities/548657/">Top US universities invite fewer women speakers than men.</a> And it's not because there aren't enough women, nor because they're turning down invitations…</li>
<li><b>Story time:</b><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/20/opinion/holiday-stories.html?_r=0">A look at ancient storytellers</a> helps us understand what stories contribute today.</li>
<li><b>What's next?</b> The folks at TED are always focused on what's next. <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/ted-talks-company-profile-2017-10">Take a peek...</a></li>
<li><b style="line-height: 18px;">Did you miss? </b><span style="line-height: 18px;">This week, the blog looked at <a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/11/famous-speech-friday-arianna-huffington.html">Arianna Huffington's mansplaining moment at the Uber all-hands meeting</a>, <a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/12/famous-speech-friday-kamala-harriss.html">Kamala Harris's interrupted Senate hearings,</a> and <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/12/losing-my-voice-about-blog-hiatus.html">what happened on my blog hiatus.</a> And we ended the week--and the year--with our <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/12/our-top-10-public-speaking-posts-for.html">top 10 most-read public speaking tips</a> and <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/12/2017s-backlash-against-women-speaking.html">2017's backlash against women speaking up: 14 big examples</a>. An ambitious comeback from hiatus, indeed.</span></li>
<li><b style="line-height: 18px;">About the quote:</b><span style="line-height: 18px;"> Eve Ensler nails it in this quote.</span></li>
</ul>
<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-53541889868617266452017-12-29T04:45:00.000-05:002017-12-29T04:45:00.199-05:002017's backlash against women speaking up: 14 big examples<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-_-2Aaomucqs/Wbao4N74odI/AAAAAAAASIU/HmdYE6F_AAkFvZ_97LoxK_prTIPWGUIfwCLcBGAs/s1600/Women%2527s_March_on_Washington_If_You.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1067" data-original-width="1600" height="213" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-_-2Aaomucqs/Wbao4N74odI/AAAAAAAASIU/HmdYE6F_AAkFvZ_97LoxK_prTIPWGUIfwCLcBGAs/s320/Women%2527s_March_on_Washington_If_You.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
We are ending 2017 with an as yet unfinished conversation about sexual harassment and what it does to silence women. For many of us, this is a welcome and long-overdue conversation. But before you start rejoicing, listen to <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/i-see-it-leading-straight-to-a-backlash-meryl-streep-and-the-post-team-talk-the-post-weinstein-era/2017/12/14/7526f66e-e116-11e7-8679-a9728984779c_story.html?utm_term=.5cc3f0f1eb9c">what actor Meryl Streep says will follow:</a><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Meryl Streep isn’t convinced that the current conversation about sexual harassment in Hollywood will lead to an immediate cultural shift. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
“I see it leading straight to a backlash,” she said during a panel discussion at The Washington Post offices Thursday. She’s not entirely pessimistic, though. Eventually, she says, change will come; it just might take some time. </blockquote>
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“I don’t think we move in an easy trajectory towards an enlightened future,” she said. “We’re gonna hit the wall on this one soon.”</blockquote>
That backlash is already in progress, which should surprise no one. I see 2017 as a full year of backlash against women speaking up publicly, and not just about sexual harassment. The proof is in the speeches and what happened when they were given. I started out to do a more typical year-end list of significant speeches by women throughout the year, and found that the speeches by women I consider most important in 2017 all have something in common: Every single one represents an effort to silence women speakers in some way, whether by interrupting her, mansplaining, not taking her comments seriously, using procedures to stop her speaking, trolling her with criticisms and threats, blaming and shaming her, and more.<br />
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That was 2017's version of backlash, backlash against the near-success of the United States in almost electing a woman president, and against the power unleashed in the Women's March which occurred on the day after the new U.S. president's inauguration. Classics scholar <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2014/03/famous-speech-friday-mary-beard-on.html">Mary Beard has said</a>, "It is still the case that when listeners hear a female voice, they don’t hear a voice that connotes authority; or rather they have not learned how to hear authority in it." But this time, the hints of that authority were strong...and so has been the reaction against it.<br />
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Virtually all of these women, in addition to continuing to speak out, have publicly labeled the backlash for what it is, and that's something that any woman speaker should get used to doing, since there will be more backlash to come. I decided to arrange the speeches chronologically so you can see how the year progressed for women speakers. It's difficult to imagine a similar list for male speakers, isn't it? That's white male speaker privilege in action, public speaking style. I hope that by collecting this list, everyone will have a chance to see how frequently women's speaking is a case of "girl, interrupted."<br />
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So does this qualify as a "best of 2017" list? I think so. These were speeches given under duress and threats, but they are forceful, persuasive, and even poetic. They certainly meet our bar for being famous. But best of all for our readers, each one is a stellar example of how to handle difficult and challenging speaking situations. I think we'll be seeing even more of those in 2018, but here's a look at how that played out this year:<br />
<ol>
<li><b>January: <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/01/famous-speech-friday-meryl-streeps.html">Meryl Streep's Golden Globes speech</a></b> was given in the early days of the new U.S. presidential administration and before the Women's March. She devoted a high-profile lifetime achievement award speech to condemn the new president. The backlash began with criticism from the none other than the newly elected president himself. At this moment, it was a rare act of defiance--but because it was prominent and first, its impact was stunning. Though an extemporaneous riff, it's worth study by speechwriters, so compact and focused is this speech.</li>
<li><b>January: <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/01/famous-speech-friday-ashley-judd-at.html">Ashley Judd's spoken word poem performance at the Women's March</a></b> -- the largest single-day protest in recorded U.S. history -- had to overcome a huge obstacle <u>before</u> she could speak: <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/01/when-man-hogs-mic-at-the-womens-march.html">Figuring out how to stop Michael Moore, one of the few male speakers, from continuing to hog the mic</a> so long that he wound up with the most time of any speaker. At a women's march. She took the stage, mic in hand, introduced herself and kept going. It's a bravura performance, easily the most lively and well-received of the day's speeches, featuring the work of a young poet. And yes, the backlash was intense.</li>
<li><b>January: <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/05/famous-speech-friday-hawaii-rep.html">Hawaii Rep. Fukumoto at the Women's March</a> </b>in her home state used this rally and speech to make public something that happened to her in private. A Republican leader of the state legislature, she had expressed dismay over the new president's words and approaches, but was told she needed to silence herself. The speech makes clear why she did not choose to do that, at a high price: She lost her leadership role and later switched political parties, but held her ground and her seat.</li>
<li><b>February: <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/02/famous-speech-friday-elizabeth-warrens.html">Elizabeth Warren's silencing in the U.S. Senate</a> </b>came as a surprise "rules enforcement" procedural power play while she held the floor. She was entering into the record a letter critical of the new nominee for Attorney General of the United States. The Senate leader abruptly forced her to stop, citing an arcane rule; later that evening, male Democratic senators read the same letter without interruption, making clear that this was discriminatory behavior. Warren left the floor and headed for Facebook Live, where she read her entire statement to an audience far larger than any that would have seen the limited broadcast of the Senate debate.</li>
<li><b>February: <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/03/famous-speech-friday-california-state.html">California State Senator Janet Nguyen's silencing</a> </b>was over a tribute to a late former state senator who'd been an activist during the war in Vietnam--her home country--supporting the Communist government that persecuted her people. She rose to make this unpopular point about the popular senator who'd just died, and was stopped, first by a procedural objection, then by being hustled away from the microphone by security guards before she could finish.</li>
<li><b>April: <a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/07/famous-speech-friday-minn-rep-hortman.html">Minnesota Rep. Hortman called out white male colleagues</a> </b>in the legislature when she realized they were leaving the floor when women--especially women of color--were speaking, effectively silencing their female colleagues by denying them an audience as the men chose to go play cards in an anteroom. And because she called it a "white male card game," she was met with calls for an apology...which she refused to give. Consider how different this legislative battle over women's voices was because a woman was in charge.</li>
<li><b>June:</b> <a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/11/famous-speech-friday-kamala-harriss.html"><b>U.S. Senator Kamala Harris got interrupted by male colleagues</b></a> twice in two weeks in the Senate--while her male and white colleagues were allowed to speak unfettered. In this case, insults were used to try to silence and shame her: She was labeled political, discourteous, and, yes, hysterical for insisting on her right to speak.</li>
<li><b>June: <a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/11/famous-speech-friday-arianna-huffington.html">Arianna Huffington got mansplained at the Uber all-hands meeting</a> </b>in the worst possible way: The meeting was on fixes for the company's sexist culture, and Huffington was announcing the appointment of another woman to the board, when a male board member interrupted and suggested that appointing one more woman just meant "more talking."</li>
<li><b>June:</b> <b><a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/10/famous-speech-friday-anita-sarkeesian.html">Anita Sarkeesian on the panel from hell at VidCon</a> </b>gives us at once an inside look at what happens when women are trolled, live, while they try to speak on panels--in this case, with row upon row of organized opposition intent on disrupting speech--as well as how Sarkeesian, among the most-trolled women speakers, has begun to address it in real time.</li>
<li><b>August:</b> <b><a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/10/famous-speech-friday-rep-maxine-waterss.html">U.S. Representative Maxine Waters's "reclaiming my time"</a> </b>used a perfectly proper House floor rule to let a non-responsive witness know that his talking without answering was not going to reduce her allotted speaking time. It became a rallying cry and also could be your new favorite phrase to use when you get talked over in a meeting next.</li>
<li><b>August: <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/09/famous-speech-friday-susan-brothey.html">Susan Bro: "They tried to kill my child to shut her up"</a> </b>was the eulogy this mother gave when her outspoken daughter was mowed down by a driver during the Charlottesville, Va., protests this year. Bro's speech served as a chance for her daughter's voice to be heard by a wider audience than ever--or, as she said, addressing herself to her child's killer, "you just magnified her."</li>
<li><b>August: <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/09/famous-speech-friday-taylor-swifts.html">Taylor Swift's harassment testimony</a> </b>gave every woman who's brought harassment charges forward a new template for how to answer leading questions in court (or elsewhere): fiercely. The questions were the typical type, intended to blame and shame the victim and thereby silence her complaint, or at least establish her lack of certainty. Not so here. Her direct responses--like "He grabbed my ass"--were offered without apology, and she wasn't afraid to correct her questioners. She won the symbolic and actual case, too.</li>
<li><b>September: <a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/10/famous-speech-friday-san-juan-mayor.html">San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz's speech, "We Are Dying Here,"</a> </b>did what mayors do when their cities are laid flat by a disaster: Ask for help from the federal government. But unlike other mayors in similar circumstance, this woman of color was dubbed "nasty" and as exhibiting "poor leadership" by none other than the U.S. president, and ignored by him when he went to Puerto Rico to meet for local officials. She keeps speaking up despite the insults and shaming tactics.</li>
<li><b>October: <a href="https://www.vogue.com/article/senator-kirsten-gillibrand-trump-feminism-vogue-november-issue-2017">UK Prime Minister Theresa May's interrupted Tory conference speech</a> </b>was interrupted by a planned, elaborate, ideal-for-the-cameras stunt that came early enough in the speech to ensure that that's all the coverage was about, on social and traditional media. A ploy to weaken her status in the party, the interruption may have been the most outrageous of our examples this year.</li>
</ol>
<i>(Wikimedia Commons <a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b8/Women%27s_March_on_Washington_If_You.jpg">photo</a> of the Women's March on Washington)</i><br />
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<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-3194999831470082652017-12-28T05:15:00.000-05:002017-12-28T05:15:00.218-05:00Our top 10 public speaking posts for 2017<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-HxhF4V3LwuU/WeYIsQYJ1sI/AAAAAAAASPk/fLfSU76H2rUtpG7w88rdF_iGsFTOH3HJQCLcBGAs/s1600/35081280053_2776f2a910_z.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="426" data-original-width="640" height="213" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-HxhF4V3LwuU/WeYIsQYJ1sI/AAAAAAAASPk/fLfSU76H2rUtpG7w88rdF_iGsFTOH3HJQCLcBGAs/s320/35081280053_2776f2a910_z.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
According to the most-read posts on this blog in 2017, readers are concerned about the many situations in which women are silenced and how to counter. But you're also just as concerned about how to improve your speaking, whether it's figuring out how to prepare better, or how to emulate one of the most popular TED talks. That's the mix of most-read posts this year, a combination of the personal and the political when it comes to public speaking. Take a look at what your fellow readers thought were our most important posts:<br />
<ol>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/04/what-linguists-think-about-um-guess-who.html">What linguists think about "um:" Guess who gets punished for using it?</a> turned to linguists when the New York Times perpetuated the myth that um should be eradicated from your speech – and the linguists pointed out a particular disadvantage for women in this debate.</li>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/01/when-man-hogs-mic-at-the-womens-march.html">When a man hogs the mic at the Women's March</a> documented how Michael Moore spoke longer any other individuals at the March, even though prominent women speakers were interrupted and told to wind up their remarks quickly. Actor Ashley Judd came up with a masterful way to stop Moore and let the program continue.</li>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/01/10-questions-to-make-you-more-resilient.html">10 questions to make you a more resilient speaker in 2017</a> was our list of resolutions for the year, in the form of questions to ask yourself as you set goals. How would you answer them this year?</li>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/03/silencers-in-appearance-v-content-for.html">Silencers: In appearance v. content for women speakers, guess which wins?</a> In this year of backlash against women speakers, their wardrobes did not escape criticism, and in some cases, focus on their wardrobes served to silence their messages.</li>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/08/when-male-moderator-wont-let-lone-woman.html">When the male moderator won't let the lone woman panelist speak</a> highlighted an especially egregious example of a nearly all-male panel and its impact on a brilliant woman scientist was ignored for the majority of the proceeding, and mansplained for the rest.</li>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/04/39-lies-myths-and-mistaken-notions.html">39 lies, myths, and mistaken notions speakers tell themselves</a> is a collection of the myths speakers use to describe themselves or their process when I am coaching that. Do you use any of these?</li>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/03/why-speaker-coaches-think-you-should.html">Why speaker coaches think you should spend more time preparing</a>. You hear it over and over speaker coaches: the more time you spend preparing, the better your talk will be. But preparation is almost always the thing that speakers give short shrift. Find out why the coaches disagree.</li>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/07/women-and-power-double-standard-of.html">Women and power? The double standard of the severed head</a> builds on an article by classic scholar Mary Beard Trump' s use of a violent image of Hillary Clinton being beheaded as Medusa, in comparison to a similar image that came under fire when comedian Kathy Griffin imitated it. The first image caused no outcry; but when when a woman used it, she had to apologize and it nearly ruined her career.</li>
<li><a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/02/what-made-this-one-of-teds-most-popular.html">What made this one of TED's most popular talks in 2016?</a> breaks down a popular talk about meditation and bad habits so you can see some of the basics of what goes into a popular talk at this popular conference.</li>
<li><a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/09/want-to-boost-conference-attendance-add.html">Want to boost conference attendance? Add women speakers</a> pokes at something that's always bothered me: why women have trouble getting on the program at most conferences, while women's conferences draw record attendance and profits. And conferences that make a point of boosting attendance by women see the results. Try it in 2018.</li>
</ol>
<i>(Creative Commons licensed photo by <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/riseconf/35081280053/in/photolist-SLphMU-SCbUJx-Vs1KRR-Sybbas-RRC7EE-WRVTC2-WFvsjz-TcYUTJ-Sr8Y5Y-TfJtCx-UMBdAm-SPt8Sn-Vs1Jm6-TSBUqo-RGgPme-Ug4JZM-SPZeuV-VkZu7G-VA3197-UvU5Vh-UvU3BQ-UiUyAU-UgucDk-TH2Gpf-SNeT9M-UqXyQW-TSHZLb-e1JLJK-hDqUnT-SLHVQ4-ReKdSk-TjxSdb-SteVHK-UiUxFs-UiUzm1-Ug4Em8-WN6L8h-TyJiKQ-UK5TJw-UZpZAH-SAh2mJ-hDrCv9-VA31CJ-Uyf8XG-SPZceT-RY9NND-SuPmQE-VCDWMV-SN22ma-SN5UXm">SM5_1000</a>)</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-77709840903205346102017-12-27T05:15:00.000-05:002017-12-27T05:15:03.747-05:00Famous Speech Friday: Kamala Harris's silenced Senate questions<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-a62BwcP9IS4/WeFNXnC2NnI/AAAAAAAASPU/HsOetylQi548oJQemU9gEga6Q0BoeKegwCLcBGAs/s1600/harris.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="386" data-original-width="486" height="254" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-a62BwcP9IS4/WeFNXnC2NnI/AAAAAAAASPU/HsOetylQi548oJQemU9gEga6Q0BoeKegwCLcBGAs/s320/harris.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<i>(Editor' s note: No, it's not Friday, but the hiatus did not let me publish this key speaking moment of 2017, so I'm using the last week of the year to catch up.)</i><br />
<br />
When a few of her Republican colleagues attempted to silence U.S. Senator Kamala Harris for the second time in as many weeks during Senate intelligence committee hearings this June, the incidents could have been read simply as an attempt by Republicans to protect members of their own party. But the media and the public quickly noticed a key little detail: Senator Harris' male and white Democratic colleagues were allowed to carry out their questioning without being admonished.<br />
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Here are a few of the tweets that appeared during the hearings:<br />
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
<div dir="ltr" lang="en">
Silencing <a href="https://twitter.com/SenKamalaHarris?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@SenKamalaHarris</a> for not being “courteous” enough is just unbelievable. Keep fighting, Kamala! <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/NeverthelessShePersisted?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#NeverthelessShePersisted</a> <a href="https://t.co/58y15qWVzU">https://t.co/58y15qWVzU</a></div>
— Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) <a href="https://twitter.com/SenWarren/status/872514688390713345?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 7, 2017</a></blockquote>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
<div dir="ltr" lang="en">
What is it about Kamala Harris that makes her the only Senator Republicans interrupt at every hearing?</div>
— Matthew Miller (@matthewamiller) <a href="https://twitter.com/matthewamiller/status/874728925800390656?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 13, 2017</a></blockquote>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
<div dir="ltr" lang="en">
The open disrespect for Kamala Harris is just wild, although, not hard to figure out where it comes from.</div>
— Jamelle Bouie (@jbouie) <a href="https://twitter.com/jbouie/status/874731023564767233?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 13, 2017</a></blockquote>
Republican Senators Richard Burr and John McCain, who interrupted Harris' questioning of Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and Attorney General Jeff Sessions, may have wanted to shut down Harris to prevent damaging revelations about the U.S. presidency from coming to light. Because she was a woman, however, they reached for <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2014/03/famous-speech-friday-mary-beard-on.html">some time-worn tools</a> to try to silence her. It's worth taking a closer look at these tools here, since they are used consistently against women speakers.<br />
<ul>
<li><span style="font-weight: bold;">Women who speak up risk being called "rude."</span> During Harris's questioning of Rosenstein, she was reprimanded by Senators McCain and Burr in a very specific way when she tried to get a "yes or no" answer out of the deputy attorney general. See if you can spot it in Burr's remarks, coming around the 2:06 mark of <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/politics/kamala-harris-admonished-by-gop-senators/2017/06/07/b533c9a2-4bcb-11e7-987c-42ab5745db2e_video.html?utm_term=.84147f2cad1a">this video</a>.
Men often say they prefer direct speech to equivocation. But when a woman like Harris is direct, that quality can often be labeled as <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2015/10/on-women-speaking-up-in-meetings.html">"rude" or "discourteous."</a> It's worth noting that Democratic Senators Ron Wyden and Martin Heinrich were similarly direct in their hearing questions, but were not reprimanded for a perceived lack of courtesy. (Heinrich was interrupted once, by McCain.) It's also worth noting that during the Sessions hearing, the attorney general complained that Harris' questioning style <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mK_HmEFxCpI&feature=player_embedded">was making him uncomfortable</a>, which suggests that he felt she was violating some rule that required her--and no one else at the hearing--to be pleasant to him.</li>
<li><span style="font-weight: bold;">Women who speak up risk being called "hysterical."</span> The qualities of being persistent and dogged in pursuit of answers underwent a suspicious transformation in the minds of some who watched Harris' questions. On CNN, former Donald Trump campaign adviser Jason Miller said that Harris was "hysterical" and "shouting" during the hearings. You can watch the videos below to judge for yourself, or I'll save you the time: no shouting took place, by any of the participants. Attempts to silence or smear women speakers by calling them hysterical have a long history, but thankfully CNN analyst Kirsten Powers <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/13/politics/powers-miller-kamala-harris-hysterical-sessions-hearing-ac360-cnntv">pointed out to Miller</a> that it was, well, a little strange that he was singling out Harris for this label.</li>
<li><span style="font-weight: bold;">Women who speak up may be called "incompetent."</span> Senators typically don't ask great questions at these hearings, preferring to give their own speeches in lieu of seeking answers. But as a former prosecutor, Harris is in fact very good at this type of questioning, which is necessary to establishing essential facts, timelines and documentation--just the kinds of things that you would think would be the aims of an investigatory hearing. Instead, Burr tried at the start of the Sessions hearing to get Harris to back down from this competent handling, by framing her style of inquiry as "taking political or partisan shots."</li>
</ul>
Harris went to straight to social media after the Sessions hearing, to request answers from the attorney general again, and to launch a new fundraising campaign for her fellow women legislators in response to her treatment.<br />
<br />
The campaign's slogan? "The women of the United States Senate will not be silenced when seeking the truth."<br />
<br />
Video of Harris at the two hearings is here:<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/E-ETIf_FYXk?rel=0" width="560"></iframe><br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/mK_HmEFxCpI?rel=0" width="560"></iframe>
<br />
<br />
<i>(This Famous Speech Friday post was contributed by freelance writer <a href="https://beckydham.wordpress.com/">Becky Ham</a>)</i><br />
<br />
<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>
Becky Hamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00924240192036928484noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-44273176870602590782017-12-26T05:15:00.000-05:002017-12-26T05:15:34.841-05:00Famous Speech Friday: Arianna Huffington at the Uber all-hands<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-KA7udVB-dBI/WccKCaoOFsI/AAAAAAAASMY/jgqp1vcHSH4l4W12mDjh5_tPqYDPhcFrwCLcBGAs/s1600/7257330882_333a0e816e_z.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="426" data-original-width="640" height="213" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-KA7udVB-dBI/WccKCaoOFsI/AAAAAAAASMY/jgqp1vcHSH4l4W12mDjh5_tPqYDPhcFrwCLcBGAs/s320/7257330882_333a0e816e_z.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<i>(Editor' s note: No, it's not Friday, but the hiatus did not let me publish this key speaking moment of 2017, so I'm using the last week of the year to catch up.)</i><br />
<br />
The all-hands meeting in corporate life is no one's favorite venue as a speaker. Rarely is it about giving everyone a car and a year off; more often, it's an effort to deliver and explain bad news, or to start fixing a company-wide problem. And so it was for the ride-sharing behemoth Uber in June. Beset by problems that ranged from sexual harassment accusations to cities revoking its licenses, the company had commissioned an independent report that gave it numerous prescriptions for fixing its sexist culture, and the June meeting was meant to address those with employees.<br />
<br />
So it was not a small moment when Uber board member Arianna Huffington, CEO of Thrive Global and founder of the Huffington Post <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/uber-david-bonderman-jokes-theres-more-talking-when-women-join-boards-2017-6">announced</a> that one of those steps would involve appointment another woman, Wan Ling Martello of Nestle Global, to the board--a step that would make women 25% of the board's makeup. At this point, Huffington was the lone woman on the board. The announcement came 7 minutes into the all hands meeting, a moment when management is usually working hard to set the tone for the rest of the session. Here's a transcript of what happened as Huffington was explaining the decision, and her fellow board member David Bonderman of TPG Capital, decided a little mansplaining was in order:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b>Huffington:</b> There's a lot of data that shows that when there's one woman on the board it's much more likely there will be a second woman on the board.</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b>Bonderman: </b>Actually, what it shows is that it's much more likely to be more talking. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b>Huffington: </b>Ohhh. Come on, David. </blockquote>
People in the room were "aghast," <a href="https://www.recode.net/2017/6/13/15795612/uber-board-member-david-bonderman-women-talk-too-much-sexism">according to</a> one report. Mansplaining often begins with just such an interruption, and the myth that women talk too much is a centuries-old trope used to shut women up--after all, if you're told you talk too much, that's a typical response. The comments were leaked almost immediately, and Bonderman later apologized and then <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/13/technology/uber-sexual-harassment-huffington-bonderman.html">resigned</a> from the board.<br />
<br />
Writing in the Washington Post, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2017/08/01/reclaiming-my-time-is-bigger-than-maxine-waters/?utm_term=.0d78cd6abfe7">Christie Emba lays out the substantive issue behind the sexism</a> of saying women talk too much in the workplace:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
At Uber, for example, more “talking” would be an uncontestable good. A lack of communication is a major reason the company has wound up in a public crisis. From its founding, the dysfunctional start-up had poorly articulated policies and provided little supervision and few ways for workers to take their concerns up the food chain. Former employee Susan J. Fowler had to turn to a public blog to report sexual harassment. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Perhaps more dialogue in the early stages would have compelled Uber’s executives to recognize all that and adopt standard business best practices — things as basic as requiring receipts for reimbursement and as major as not turning a blind eye to harassment by “high-performing” employees — years ago. Having more women on its board in the earlier days (Huffington joined only last year) might have led the company to address the sexism in its culture before it spiraled out of control.</blockquote>
What can you learn from this famous, interrupted speech?<br />
<ul>
<li><b> Make clear sexist comments are not acceptable:</b> Huffington might have done more, but in the moment--who was expecting a sexist remark at a meeting on sexism?--her rebuke at least made clear that the view was one a dinosaur might hold, and not appropriate.</li>
<li><b>Remember that your presence and voice are essential,</b> no matter how outnumbered you may be as a woman. Both in this more public meeting and many private ones, Huffington was the lone female voice battling the culture. Imagine this meeting had there been no female board member. </li>
<li><b>Audiences don't like sexist treatment of women speakers</b>. Guess what? Here's another case where the audience objected immediately (and probably leaked audio of the exchange that fast, too). Audiences have helped back up beleaguered women speakers a lot this year, and I like that trend.</li>
</ul>
<a href="https://finance.yahoo.com/news/inside-ubers-hands-meeting-travis-194232221.html?soc_src=social-sh&soc_trk=tw">Leaked audio from the meeting is here</a>, and the relevant part begins at the 6:40 mark.<br />
<br />
<i>(Creative Commons licensed photo by <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/c2mtl/7257330882/in/photolist-c4iHCw-8UFbi5-c4iBYU-c4iKPh-c4iA8W-c4iBqG-95Ms8u-9gxo4c-5AKQwd-5AFzRX-8aqoXM-9LdmGL-d2Gw7Y-Jz2Ao-c4h6w3-5AKQxj-4PD7Hu-oiBHN-Jz2xy-deEEM2-Jz5Li-8hXC68-8i1RM3-8i1REb-5TnJ1Y-9DK9VR-bCic9U-deEtBB-ateCxs-ateAXW-ateBPs-atbXRk-bRcTPR-atbYbk-atbXWT-atbYy4-atbZmn-ateB2A-4KtjCw-9n4Lyn-aPibAk-8i1RKf-a2KPuF-a2KPwZ-a2KPqc-a2NFGy-a2NFFC-a2NFBG-a2KPmH-a2KPfr">C2 Montreal</a>)</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-42421573020194969242017-12-25T05:00:00.000-05:002017-12-25T11:19:05.850-05:00Losing my voice: About the blog hiatus<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-6LehFm2o5tM/Wj7OOAkhMRI/AAAAAAAASSQ/ou9REZtHAvI-XlUePqWwlbw3oUn6NcWzACLcBGAs/s1600/7069893153_4606a1391a_z.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="444" data-original-width="640" height="222" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-6LehFm2o5tM/Wj7OOAkhMRI/AAAAAAAASSQ/ou9REZtHAvI-XlUePqWwlbw3oUn6NcWzACLcBGAs/s320/7069893153_4606a1391a_z.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
I announced on November 3 that this blog would be on hiatus until the end of the year. And in truth, I was planning to take a hiatus for the month of December, anyway. But starting back in August, I found myself in and out of the hospital, first with a mystery disease that couldn't be diagnosed; then a diagnosis of lymphoma, a type of blood cancer; and then, just as I was about to start treatment for, the cancer, I developed Guillain–Barré syndrome, which paralyzed my hands and feet and parts of my arms and legs. As part of the treatment for that, I was put on a breathing tube and later had a tracheotomy – two things that, at times, rendered me speechless and unable to use my voice. And since my hands are such a big part of creating my online voice, it made sense to silence the blog while they were inoperable. Even now, I'm using dictation software to write this post.<br />
<br />
One of the great miracles about Guillain–Barré syndrome is that it is reversible, going back the way it came, so my hands and feet, which were the first to be affected, will be the last to recover. I can't tell you how grateful I am to be able to recover my actual speaking voice, and to have the prospect of recovering all my other functions, particularly my hands.<br />
<br />
I'm currently in rehab, working on physical therapy and work projects, but I want to get the blog going for 2018. I'm going to publish a couple of Famous Speech Fridays that need to be reflected in 2017, so this week we will declare Tuesday and Wednesday to be honorary Fridays. I'm also going to publish our annual list of the most-read public speaking tips on the blog this year, and you may be surprised by what's included on that list. Finally, I'll share a look at the year in speaking for women, using some of this year's most prominent speeches and what they all have in common.<br />
<br />
I'm sure will have some fits and starts getting the blog up and running again, and I appreciate your patience with that process. I'm looking forward to getting back to the very important discussion we're having worldwide about women's voices and their place in the world in the workplace. And I hope in the comments thread on this particular post so that you can share your thoughts about where you would like to see the blog go in 2018. Thanks as always for reading!<br />
<br />
<br />
<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-65506544624099933822017-11-03T05:15:00.001-04:002017-12-17T07:07:02.947-05:00A blog hiatusI'm taking the rest of the year off as far as blogging is concerned.<br />
<br />
After I took a blog and social-media hiatus in June, using a small portion of it to build up my queue of posts, <a href="http://www.dontgetcaught.biz/2017/08/using-blog-hiatus-to-well-blog.html">I wrote</a>, "I liked this catch-up approach so much I may try it again later this year."<br />
<i><br /></i>Well, later has rolled around, and I'm taking another hiatus from now until the end of the year. I'll be back for the year-end roundup of the blog's most popular posts in the last week of the year, but otherwise won't be publishing. I'll be using some of the time to build great content for you in 2018.<br />
<br />
<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-81043319789579100822017-11-02T05:15:00.000-04:002017-11-02T05:15:01.298-04:005 easy, everyday ways to gently promote yourself as a public speaker<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-4h3o8AWC8to/WVwO3_Ck2TI/AAAAAAAAR7c/PbqkpSQ7neE1j_LKZv1Kh7wjHU6G_KMGACLcBGAs/s1600/5374200948_539b10fb1c_z.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="426" data-original-width="640" height="213" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-4h3o8AWC8to/WVwO3_Ck2TI/AAAAAAAAR7c/PbqkpSQ7neE1j_LKZv1Kh7wjHU6G_KMGACLcBGAs/s320/5374200948_539b10fb1c_z.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
You already know that I advocate <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2013/01/why-and-how-you-should-publish-your.html">making sure your speeches and presentations are published</a>--not just for the record, although that's important, particularly for women speakers. But there's more you can do to gently promote yourself as a speaker and get your next speaking gig. Here are five easy, everyday ways to do that:<br />
<ol>
<li><b>Your email signature: </b>Add a line to your email signature with a link to the program for your upcoming speech (or just completed one) and share some quick perspective. Invite people to come see you, or to watch the video.</li>
<li><b>Your "out of the office" message:</b> Away on a speaking gig? Add it to your out-of-office message to let colleagues and clients know the details, and encourage them to follow it on social media.</li>
<li><b>Your LinkedIn posts: </b>Had a great reception from your recent audience? Spoke at a major conference? That's a great short update to your LinkedIn profile. Don't forget that you can add videos of your talks, and your SlideShare slides to that profile, too.</li>
<li><b>Your other social channels: </b>You can start a conversation with your audience ahead of or after your speech, update those who missed you in action, or just note the occasion for the record. Add a particularly good quote from your text, or share that video (see below).</li>
<li><b>Your friend with a smartphone: </b>No matter when or where you are speaking, recruit a pal to record it on her smartphone. That video can help you learn from the talk, as well as get future gigs--if you post it. Remember that conference organizers look for video to confirm whether you are a good speaker. The production values don't need to be Hollywood-quality...but if you can get a professional video from the organizers, do.</li>
</ol>
<i>(Creative Commons licensed photo by <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/dafnecholet/5374200948/in/photolist-9bUbH3-3xU18-8QQ8K3-2WX1J-2a3hQ-q2VEP-9Tjoap-76v1pT-9Tjo7V-5U7uqn-3qMfSb-3qMfY7-6hEsk-rUyG8-6CHvXt-VWcLP-5SLjF-5vZnPr-ztku6-8TQz57-bR4TB-bnfFRG-3Pk7f7-4cUF23-4JxCpF-2aNjrB-fsTz3-v3Tiq-6CMGa9-aPejuT-85Kbxu-7TuSV-7rg49R-v3ThC-ciW6b-67DVkN-v3TgT-6CMGH7-6CMFsb-9gZGC3-fTtMs-8ZpGMD-5jLKHc-4bHpe2-E5tpq-qs1Tpp-7AC132-MSmF-8ncqCK-8U4eJC">Dafne Cholet</a>)</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-39731619960553204832017-10-30T05:15:00.000-04:002017-10-30T05:15:00.160-04:00The Eloquent Woman's weekly speaker toolkit<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-En-jbIfq14E/WU24nNmFrBI/AAAAAAAAR1Q/2JS1x7hDZug_qBxmug5rTt5dJ8jtTJoFgCLcBGAs/s1600/HRC%2Bquote.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1600" height="320" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-En-jbIfq14E/WU24nNmFrBI/AAAAAAAAR1Q/2JS1x7hDZug_qBxmug5rTt5dJ8jtTJoFgCLcBGAs/s320/HRC%2Bquote.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">I read a lot about women and public speaking, and post my finds first on </span><a href="http://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman" style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">The Eloquent Woman on Facebook</a>. But <span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">I always collect them here for you on Mondays as well. Here's what I've been reading lately:</span><br />
<ul>
<li><b style="line-height: 18px;">Handy: </b><span style="line-height: 18px;"><a href="https://curiosity.com/topics/talking-with-your-hands-can-help-you-learn-curiosity/">Talking with your hands can help you learn</a>--but also has great advantages for public speakers.</span></li>
<li><span style="line-height: 18px;"><b>Speaker's notes:</b> Frequent speaker <a href="https://michaelhyatt.com/12-surprising-evernote-uses.html">Michael Hyatt shares how he uses Evernote</a> to keep his speaking resources, including his tags and topics.</span></li>
<li><b style="line-height: 18px;">Did you miss? </b><span style="line-height: 18px;">This week, the blog looked at <a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/08/10-things-you-can-do-with-pause-in-your.html">11 things you can do with a pause in your speech</a>, and Famous Speech Friday looked at <a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/10/famous-speech-friday-rep-maxine-waterss.html">Rep. Maxine Waters's "reclaiming my time" approach to mansplaining.</a></span></li>
<li><b style="line-height: 18px;">About the quote:</b><span style="line-height: 18px;"> Make your voices heard, eloquent women! Wisdom from Hillary Clinton.</span></li>
</ul>
<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-53467778776350319212017-10-27T04:45:00.001-04:002017-10-27T04:45:00.191-04:00Famous Speech Friday: Rep. Maxine Waters's "reclaiming my time"<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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In America, we started this year with a million women marching in Washington, DC, and yet more doing the same around the world. Now the same group behind the Women's March is convening a <a href="http://www.womensconvention.com/">Women's Convention</a> this weekend in Detroit, Michigan--and they're using a now-iconic line from U.S. Representative Maxine Waters as the theme, "Reclaiming my time."<br />
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The now-famous three-word phrase is part of the <a href="http://archives.democrats.rules.house.gov/archives/floor_man.htm#XI">House of Representatives floor procedures</a>, typically during a debate: "<span style="background-color: white;">The gentleman who has yielded may at any time 'reclaim' his time and then the other Member must stop speaking and allow him to continue." But here, Waters was questioning a hearing witness, U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, about why he had not responded to her and other members of Congress after a May 23 letter, and she didn't feel as if he was answering the question. Mnuchin objected, appealing to the committee chair, and noting that the chair had announced that Mnuchin, as a witness, was not to be interrupted.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white;">"What he failed to tell you is that when you are on my time, I can reclaim it," Waters explained, and then asked again for the Treasury secretary to answer the question. </span><span style="background-color: white;">Waters, who has served in Congress since 1991, used the rules to keep him from using up her time to speak with non-responsive answers. </span><span style="background-color: white;">And as the secretary launched again into a long and not direct answer, Waters simply repeated, "Reclaiming my time. Reclaiming my time. Reclaiming my time," over and over--the implication being, "You're wasting my allotted time to speak, and I'm not having it." And her question never was answered. It's a great example of a common Washington tactic of obfuscating your non-answer by wrapping it in a lot of solid-sounding other details to one side of the point...and Waters saw right through it.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white;">In the Washington Post, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2017/08/01/reclaiming-my-time-is-bigger-than-maxine-waters/">Christine Emba noted</a>, "In a year studded with absurd examples of men interrupting their female colleagues, a dignified woman’s firm insistence on being heard and getting straight to business was a welcome and empowering surprise." </span><span style="background-color: white;">The phrase was seized upon by women tired of mansplaining and interruptions, and took social media and traditional media coverage by storm. What can you learn from this famous speech?</span><br />
<br />
<ul>
<li><b>Know the rules and procedures: </b>You don't have to be working by House rules or Robert's Rules of Order, but it's important to know, going into your public speaking gig, what's allowed and what isn't--from you and from your audience and other speakers. The only way to use the rules to your advantage is to know them.</li>
<li><b>Repeat as needed:</b> Waters kept it simple. She explained the rules to the witness, politely, and asked the question again. When he started another non-answer, she just repeated the phrase that was short and official--uttering "reclaiming my time" has actual meaning for how much time she has left to speak.</li>
<li><b>Stand up for your time to speak:</b> Whether you're on a panel or get interrupted while speaking in a meeting, this is a great phrase to add to your back-pocket arsenal. Whatever you do, don't let others derail the full amount of time you should be speaking.</li>
</ul>
Watch the video of the short exchange below.<br />
<i><br /></i><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/0EvuBakBj3I?rel=0" width="450"></iframe>
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<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-9831546236556608972017-10-26T05:15:00.000-04:002017-10-26T05:15:00.175-04:0011 things you can do with a pause in your speech<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zKa1zUtKF-8/WRn4B00KLWI/AAAAAAAARg0/OVqHVw0CPwMkxrZMIq6cYL6-vtV_FoVnACLcB/s1600/373671789_a9e3999d44_m.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zKa1zUtKF-8/WRn4B00KLWI/AAAAAAAARg0/OVqHVw0CPwMkxrZMIq6cYL6-vtV_FoVnACLcB/s1600/373671789_a9e3999d44_m.jpg" /></a></div>
I sometimes think the simple pause is among the most overlooked yet versatile tools in the public speaking arsenal. Short and silent, it's easy to overlook.<br />
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Pauses, if chosen and used wisely, can add much to your next speech, talk, or presentation. Here are 11 things you can do with a pause in your speech. How many have you tried?<br />
<ol>
<li><b>Recall what you want to say</b>, without blurting out "I forgot..." and breaking your and the audience's concentration.</li>
<li><b>Let us hear your lists and sentences.</b> A brief one-beat pause every time your script has a comma between items in a list, and a two-beat pause when there's a hard stop to a sentence, will slow you down a little and let us hear what you are saying.</li>
<li><b>Replace an um or a word you overuse.</b> There is nothing wrong with the totally normal um, but if you are trying to avoid using it too frequently, try a pause and a mental, not verbal, um. Ditto any word your listeners have pointed out is overused in your presentations.</li>
<li><b>Let your applause finish.</b> If your talk is being recorded, this helps make sure your next line will be captured without claps drowning it out.</li>
<li><b>Ditto the audience's laughs. </b>If you've landed a successful bit of humor and you get laughs, a pause lets them finish before you launch into the next bit.</li>
<li><b>Signal a switch in tone, topic, or direction. </b>Pausing between two disparate parts of your talk can tell the audience something new is next.</li>
<li><b>Conquer dry mouth</b> by gently biting your tongue a time or two to produce saliva. Try it--it's a tip from operatic soprano Luciano Pavarotti, which I got from a makeup artist who heard him sharing it.</li>
<li><b>Add emphasis.</b> A pause before...during...or after something you wish to emphasize can be a powerful verbal tool in a talk. Try pauses at different intervals and plan them during your practice, not on the fly.</li>
<li><b>Stop yourself from crying.</b> Shut your mouth--so you don't take in too much air and prompt a sob--and breath through your nose, and wait. If your talk is on an emotional topic, the audience will understand the pause, and they'll be with you.</li>
<li><b>Give the other person a break in the action (yours) so they can talk.</b> If you rush to fill all available space--particularly in Q&A or in a conversation or negotiation--you'll never find out what the other person has to say. Pausing lets them get a word in edgewise. This is especially important in media interviews, but also when you are conversing with someone for whom your language is their second language--they need pauses to think and frame a response.</li>
<li><b>Start a thoughtful response to a question. </b>There's a three-part formula to answering questions: Pause. Answer. Stop. The pause allows you to hear the complete question, rather than make assumptions before the questioner is done speaking, and buys you time to formulate an answer.</li>
</ol>
<i>(Creative Commons licensed photo by <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/justin_case/373671789/in/photolist-z2aB4-SSvAtS-6ScMxG-ctrvvw-dsXMXP-oCghWE-rakXNU-8pjo1n-aLrk3z-3CKKEE-qtwXfx-3MQqiz-8Sq6KD-Sy15BX-n9KUea-pNsAuB-UhZ287-vTrqKE-fmf4cu-aTBZB2-nHp2Vw-cFNdiS-nRZLki-6ZY4q8-oMW7Zm-dtTQpc-fbBZkq-oLvKQB-a1cmHj-omAQcn-Ume5YX-REvDtR-6PLwCZ-9aRzYL-poygqS-9iWuFX-FHEuQh-fruXWi-HbM9RV-TsWFDm-daKnGV-UqycKG-cRaY6b-RUZkEY-5Ez1Kp-nmmop1-p5uCN7-gkHVxD-oPA6nC-qF3Da8">Dr. Case</a>)</i><br />
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<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-13297729391324148872017-10-23T05:15:00.000-04:002017-10-23T05:15:00.171-04:00The Eloquent Woman's weekly speaker toolkit<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-nF41vvrdWbo/WU24Vn6IJTI/AAAAAAAAR1M/owg7i34JoRcjVJXfq-2x3cIqlgaDUCafACLcBGAs/s1600/MRoberts%2Bquote.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-nF41vvrdWbo/WU24Vn6IJTI/AAAAAAAAR1M/owg7i34JoRcjVJXfq-2x3cIqlgaDUCafACLcBGAs/s320/MRoberts%2Bquote.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">I read a lot about women and public speaking, and post my finds first on </span><a href="http://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman" style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">The Eloquent Woman on Facebook</a>. But <span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18px;">I always collect them here for you on Mondays as well. Here's what I've been reading lately:</span><br />
<ul>
<li><span style="line-height: 18px;"><b>No:</b> Refusing to answer questions about past salary--now considered a best practice for applicants--<a href="http://time.com/money/4834777/job-interview-question-past-salary/">helps men, but hurts women.</a></span></li>
<li><b>Ja:</b> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/education/2017/jul/02/why-we-should-learn-german-john-le-carre?CMP=fb_gu">In a lovely speech</a> about the benefits of knowing a second language. John le Carré quotes Charlemagne: “To have another language is to possess a second soul.”</li>
<li><b style="line-height: 18px;">Did you miss? </b><span style="line-height: 18px;">This week, the blog looked at <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/07/let-it-go-how-to-tell-when-your-public.html">Let it go: How to tell when your public speaking script should be frozen</a>, and Famous Speech Friday shared <a href="https://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/10/famous-speech-friday-anita-sarkeesian.html">Anita Sarkeesian's clap back at her trolls at VidCon.</a> And an extra: <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2017/10/10-lessons10-years-into-blogging.html">I shared 10 lessons, 10 years into The Eloquent Woman blog.</a></span></li>
<li><b style="line-height: 18px;">About the quote:</b><span style="line-height: 18px;"> Know your audience, but don't let them silence you. Wisdom from Michele Roberts.</span></li>
</ul>
<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-76495350583783033562017-10-20T04:45:00.000-04:002017-10-20T04:45:01.882-04:00Famous Speech Friday: Anita Sarkeesian tackles trolls at VidCon<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-GVV7Mj6F1rI/WdS3Jwd97tI/AAAAAAAASNg/r-jxLY6sag8EPvhYRgaYRPWRZT0hJMNsACLcBGAs/s1600/sark.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="449" data-original-width="801" height="179" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-GVV7Mj6F1rI/WdS3Jwd97tI/AAAAAAAASNg/r-jxLY6sag8EPvhYRgaYRPWRZT0hJMNsACLcBGAs/s320/sark.png" width="320" /></a></div>
You've read--here and elsewhere--about women getting harassed on panels at conferences, particularly in the tech space. But if you haven't experienced what that looks and feels like at a real conference panel, it can be hard to imagine.<br />
<br />
So let's use this VidCon panel from June that featured media and gaming critic Anita Sarkeesian, one of the most trolled women speakers on the planet. <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2013/01/famous-speech-friday-anita-sarkeesian.html">Sarkeesian spoke graphically about her harassment in a TED talk in 2013</a>, but this panel offers a real example, <a href="https://www.polygon.com/features/2017/6/27/15880582/anita-sarkeesian-garbage-human-vidcon-interview">captured in this article</a>. And in this case, Sarkeesian called out her trolls:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The panel's first question drops. It’s about why feminism — online and in games — is an issue worthy of discussion. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Sarkeesian notes Benjamin's presence and begins speaking. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"If you Google my name on YouTube you get shitheads like this dude who are making these dumb-assed videos," she says. "They just say the same shit over and over again. I hate to give you attention because you're a garbage human. These dudes just making endless videos that go after every feminist over and over again is a part of the issue of why we have to have these conversations."</blockquote>
And to help you picture what Sarkeesian was seeing, here's what one of the harassers said in the article about how they set up their intimidation effort:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"We carefully organized this so that on one side of the audience we would all make up the top three rows,” he says. “We would all be sitting there filming it," he adds, before naming several allies....It was such an adrenaline high to be there in the situation, to shit-post, in this trolling kind of way." He goes on to claim there was "no malice" in their actions and that it was “playful.”</blockquote>
Later, asked about the panel and calling out the harassers, Sarkeesian said, "As women, we're always told not to engage, not to 'stoke the fire,' and that forces us into silence, it forces us to be quiet in the face of harassment. That silence helps perpetuate a culture in which harassment is permissible or even accepted as 'normal.' And so I think that for some women who understand what I’ve been through or who have been through it themselves, it was cathartic to see me not stay silent, to see me call him out directly like that, to acknowledge in front of all those people what he’s done."<br />
<br />
What can you learn from this panel from hell?<br />
<ul>
<li><b>It's important to show up and speak, anyway:</b> I know a lot of women who just avoid speaking gigs due to this phenomenon of trolls in the audience. Sarkeesian gets trolled more than most, but she continues to show up and call out the bad behavior. It's a good model for you to follow to take back control of your speaking opportunities.</li>
<li><b>Call them out <u>directly</u>:</b> That wording is so important psychologically. Instead of responding with general complaints about harassment, get specific and direct. Don't use euphemisms. Call a troll a troll, and use your microphone and platform. Yes, that takes up time from your planned message, but it's important. As Sarkeesian said, "it was cathartic to see me not stay silent, to see me call him out directly like that, to acknowledge in front of all those people what he’s done." If it's the same guy or guys every time, borrow one of my all-time-favorite lines from Ronald Reagan: "there you go again." </li>
<li><b>Know and work the conference code of conduct, and security:</b> If you expect this to happen, ask for a conference organizer and security to be present for your session to witness any infraction of the code. Be sure you know the code of conduct, and whom to call. And refusing to speak at conferences without codes also is a good start, though a code is no guarantee of good behavior. Also consider having your colleagues help out by making their own video documentation if need be, and let them know what to watch for.</li>
</ul>
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtMnWmW6jrk">RealBeal made this video</a> with her own commentary after witnessing the panel from the front row. It's a good reminder that these practices are bad for the audience as well as the speakers:<br />
<i><br /></i><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/XtMnWmW6jrk?rel=0" width="560"></iframe>
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<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3991093369716780889.post-15760619645809638432017-10-19T05:15:00.000-04:002017-10-19T05:15:00.169-04:00Let it go: How to tell when your public speaking script should be frozen<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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When I'm coaching speakers who are preparing and then memorizing a script for a talk--often a talk in the style of TED--we invest a lot of time on the script early in the process. We discuss concepts, go through drafts, reorganize, restate, revise. And then we do it again, as much as is needed to make the talk work for both speaker and audience. By the time we're done, that talk is like a polished jewel. So how do I keep the speaker from revising it into oblivion, right up until the last minute?<br />
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I declare the script "frozen."<br />
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By that I mean no more major revisions, a key part of the process for the speaker who wants to have a prayer of knowing her talk when the time comes to deliver it. It's the opposite of the speaker who makes lots of tweaks and changes, right up until the moment of delivery. That keeps moving the goal posts on your goal of memorizing the talk, and even makes delivery with notes difficult.<br />
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Declaring your script frozen, and keeping it that way, takes a lot of self-control. But neither freezing the script, nor memorization, are perfect processes. So we allow for a couple of types of changes:<br />
<ul>
<li>Where you <u>repeatedly</u> stumble, make a change in the script, either omitting or replacing the word or words that are giving you trouble; and</li>
<li>Where you <u>repeatedly</u> forget a word, group of words, or sentence, do the same: omit or replace.</li>
</ul>
Other than that, however, work on memorizing what you have so carefully crafted.<br />
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Engineer <a href="http://eloquentwoman.blogspot.com/2015/07/talk-about-talk-drlucyrogerss-space.html">Lucy Rogers shared with this blog</a> her experience experimenting a bit too much with when she froze her speech: "I froze [my script] on the Tuesday, before giving it on the Thursday...I wasn’t word perfect. I changed the first line and I missed out some of the jokes...Note to self: freeze the speech longer in advance to give yourself chance to learn it."<br />
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If you're still tempted to make change after change, it's a good opportunity to pull back and ask yourself why you're anxious about this speech. Too many changes can be a signal that you're in over-prepare mode. Take the time to work on your anxiety before the speech, rather than take it out on your script.<br />
<i><br /></i><i>(<a href="http://frozen.disney.com/gallery?image_id=532244555bd0f54bf7c6488a">Disney press kit image</a> from the movie Frozen)</i><br />
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<i>Get involved in more conversations on public speaking with The Eloquent Woman. Follow our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheEloquentWoman">Facebook page</a>, read <a href="https://www.pinterest.com/dgraveline/great-quotes-by-eloquent-women/">great quotes from eloquent woman on Pinterest</a>, or follow me as <a href="https://www.twitter.com/dontgetcaught">@dontgetcaught</a> on Twitter. Learn how to be a better panel moderator with </i><i><a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/book/the-eloquent-womans-guide-to-moderating-panels">The Eloquent Woman's Guide to Moderating Panels.</a></i>eloquentwomanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12736800559249302802noreply@blogger.com0