Structure of an Effective Introductory Speech about Career ( a sample speech)
Introduction:
- Hook: People who know me and my parents often predict that I’ll be an engineer, just like my parents. But I often disappoint them by saying,” Sorry no. I want to study literature and media when I go to college. A Humanity major.”
- Context: While my father is known to his friends as an aerodynamic engineer, few people know my parents are avid readers and secret literature lovers. My father loves literature and often introduce me classics to read while my mother loves newspapers, magazines, radio shows and media, which puts me in the current news cycle whether I want it or not. Reading and talking about what we read is something we do as we so chores, have dinner or on family vacations. There is no escape. I became enamored with both the media and literary worlds and I want to live my life in both fictional and realistic worlds.
Body
- ADD an anecdote: I still remember the day when I made the decision to study literature for my career. When I was a freshman in HS, I was introduced to Jane Austin and her books. The first book was Pride and Prejudice in which I met this brave and different female character from the 17th century. She is self-taught and intelligent and dare reject a man that every girl secretly hopes to marry. She is proud when women of her time were mostly controlled by men and their only hope was to marry a rich man. I followed her decision making process, her regrets, tears and laughter. I felt I knew her and the shy me became more emboldened and encouraged by a literary character from almost 300 years ago. I thought I would follow my parents’ footsteps but after I finished the book, I knew I had to pursue what I wanted to do.
- Reflection: Reading literature has opened a world that I didn’t know before, met people who were so different from me and yet I feel connected to these brave female characters. I learned history, understood what obstacles women had to confront during the time when they didn’t count in the society but only were treated as progeny producing machine. I met more courageous characters like Gwendolyn Brook in The Middle March and Jane in Jane Eyre. They have different stories but in the end they all share one thing in common they dare choose their own paths for the future following their passion no matter how limited it may be.
Conclusion (with a universal truth) : Even though we are now living in a digital world, I know I want my future world to go all the way back to Homer, his heroes and gods and goddesses. I want to know how the ancient Greek women lived through Antigone or Medea and how women have been surviving and stayed strong since the day they were kicked out of Garden of Eden because Eve was curious and thirsty for knowledge. I want my future career to evolve around stories about real or fictitious characters and help connect the past with the present and future. I may not know what exactly I will be but I do know my future will have an impact on the world through my spiritual connections with all humanity, past, present and future.