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Analyzing Conan O Brein's Commencement Speech

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Commencement speeches are always a great place to find persuasive strategies; a great example is Conan O’Brein’s commencement speech at Dartmouth College in the year 2011. Conan is able to use comedy as a way to portray his thoughts and give a powerful speech about the trials and conflicts of life. O'Brien uses a plethora of literary devices to help the graduates better understand his primary points in the speech. Conan O'Brien effectively uses ethos, pathos, and repetition to convey to the graduating class of Dartmouth College that change is inevitable and that how people are able to embrace change is what makes humans grow as a society. Conan’s main focus of this speech was to keep it light and breezy to allow the audience to connect better …show more content…

Another prominent literary device used throughout the speech is ethos. O’Brien himself is a famous comedian and he understands that, so he effectively uses ethos to establish his credibility and keep the audience engaged. A great example of this is “Before I begin, I must point out that behind me sits a highly admired President of the United States and decorated war hero while I, a cable television talk show host, have been chosen to stand here and impart wisdom. I pray I never witness a more damning example of what is wrong with America today.” O’Brien stated. Here Conan establishes his credibility by using comedy to explain how Dartmouth chose him to speak while the president of the United States of America is sitting right behind him. He uses comedy to portray that something is wrong with America for choosing him over the president, but it effectively establishes his credibility as a comedian to open the speech with a joke and show the audience that he himself knows what he is talking about. O'Brien is a very successful late-night talk show host and comedian, he expresses this in the quote above and uses ethos to portray this. O’Brien also again uses comedy to establish credibility and keep the speech lighthearted and laid-back giving the audience the chance to connect and stay

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Pathos can be defined as the use of emotion to persuade, therefore by illustrating these acts of bravery by American Citizens during times of crisis he is intriguing his audience and helping them to perhaps make emotional connections to what he is going to say. By beginning with Ethos he is preparing whom he is addressing to have a larger dedication and understanding for what he will say during the rest of his address. An example of this is when President Trump states, "In the aftermath of that terrible shooting, we came together, not as Republicans or Democrats, but as representatives of the people. But it is not enough to come together only in times of tragedy. Tonight, I call upon all of us to set aside our differences, to seek out common ground, and to summon the unity we need to deliver for the people.

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