Writing Speeches

 Writing a speech consists of composing the central point or thesis, the main-point sentences, the introduction and conclusion, and planning effective oral style.

Since the organization of a speech is critical to the writing process, consult our organization page.

Keeping focus: The central point

The central point is the message you attempt to communicate to your audience. Keeping focus on the central point is fundamental to speech writing.

Sometimes the central point is a thesis; sometimes the central point is a hypothesis. Sometimes, there is no stated thesis or hypothesis, but there is always a central idea and purpose that keeps you and your audience focused thesis statement example.

The Student Resources information on purpose is useful if you’re unsure about the central point.

For an additional resource related to writing for speeches, use The Writing Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, especially the “What’s your purpose?” section.

Thesis

A thesis is a concise statement of your central point, normally included in the introduction and conclusion of a speech. However, your speech doesn’t have to be an argumentative to include a thesis statement.

A purpose statement is a clear statement about the objective you hope to accomplish. Whenever you write a speech, you have a purpose statement, although the purpose statement isn’t always explicitly stated—and it can get confused with a thesis statement. For help with the differences between a thesis and a purpose statement, we recommend “Thesis and Purpose Statements” by The Writing Center, University of Wisconsin-Madison.

If a thesis is necessary, the thesis section of the thesis section of the written rhetoric page may help as well.

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There is no formula for success, but this video covers the essentials on speech thesis sentences.

The thesis is what you argue, and the main points are how you argue it. Because they’re so intertwined, you should carefully consider the main supporting points as you write your thesis. In other words, figure out what you intend to say before you try to capture it in a thesis.

Below are a few suggestions that experienced speech writers use when writing thesis statements:

Use a declarative sentence; not a question.

Use a complete sentence.

Be specific and tend to avoid generalities.

General thesis: “We honor Elie Wiesel for his noble characteristics and his campaign against ethnic oppression.”

Specific thesis: “We honor Elie Wiesel for his determination, consistency, and for his faithfulness to Yahweh throughout his life-long campaign against ethnic oppression.”

Create a narrowly focused, topic idea.

General: Foreign policies in the Middle East.

Focused: An analysis of the ways the United States has reacted to economic changes due to the oil industry in the Middle East.

Adapt your thesis to the audience. This includes vocabulary, length, and even topic choice.

Example 1: If you’re speaking to elementary schoolers, it would be inappropriate to use graduate level vocabulary.

Example 2: If you’re talking about architecture at an electrical engineering conference, use the thesis to connect the expected topic to the unexpected topic.

Here are a few high quality thesis examples (though possibly obscure topics):

“The process the United States would go through to use a nuclear weapon can be broken down into two stages: the command from the president, and the official launch of the nuclear warhead by the crew.”

“We honor Elie Wiesel for his determination, consistency, and for his faithfulness to Yahweh throughout his life-long campaign against ethnic oppression.”

“Salvador Dali’s surrealist artwork can be identified through its focus on illogical scenes and exploration of the unconscious.”

For further direction, we recommend the Purdue University Online Writing Lab (OWL) as an extra resource.

Main supporting points

The main points support your thesis. The thesis is what you argue, the main points are how you argue it. Here are a few suggestions for writing main supporting point sentences:

If any of your main points don’t argue in favor of the thesis, either the main point or the thesis needs to be changed.

A main point should convey the purpose and focus of its respective section.

Use declarative statements and complete sentences to announce main supporting points.

Limit the number of main points for the audience’s sake. If you have more than four it will be hard for the audience to remember.

To reiterate, the main points of a speech are crafted as supporting evidence for the thesis.

If your thesis is: Typical characteristics of 1960’s Latin American fiction include non-linear narratives and magical elements.

The following would be satisfactory main point sentences:

Magical elements often appear in 1960s Latin American fiction.

Non-linear narratives characterize magical realism in 1960s Latin American fiction.

Additional resources related to main supporting points Introductions

It will help you to prepare the introduction after preparing the main points. Just consider how challenging it is to introduce a speech if you don’t know what the main ideas of your speech are.

The introduction has two main purposes: to capture the audience’s attention and to state your thesis. Introductions also preview the speech so that the audience knows where it’s headed.

There are many ways to capture the audience’s attention: quotes, statistics, examples, a short story, a fascinating topic, a gracious mention of the event that brings you together, or even a question.

Once you have the audience’s attention, state your thesis. Stating your thesis will inform the audience of the speech’s direction and will focus their attention throughout the speech.

For tips regarding introductions, we recommend the Oral Communication Center, Hamilton College. The tips are short, helpful, and if applied, will improve your introductions.

Finally, it’s also critical throughout the introduction to establish your credibility. For this reason, your introduction should be well practiced and should allow you to communicate confidence. In addition, if you have any expertise on the subject material that you believe your audience needs to know, inform them without being snooty.