Assignment: Rhetorical Analysis - General Conference

For Latter-day Saints, the semi-annual General Conference meetings are a rich feast -- not only of religion, but of rhetoric (I am using rhetoric in the neutral sense of the term). In short, there is a lot of engaging speaking and speakers!

I want my Mormon literature students to analyze one of the speeches presented during one of the various sessions of the conference. To this end, I have created a form they will use to make notes while listening to a speech of their choice, and this will be used as they prepare a blog post.

Here is the link to the speech analysis form. There, students will find instructions for how to do an analysis, and they can also consult Silva Rhetoricae: The Forest of Rhetoric if they need to review any rhetorical terms.

What will they do with this?
Students should bring their completed form with them to class on Monday, October 6, for discussion. Following our class discussion about General Conference on Monday, students will prepare a blog post for October 7 based upon the talk they analyzed, as well as upon at least one other speech by that speaker from the past. The blog post (about 300 words) should draw some general points about the speaker's methods, in the way modeled in this analysis about Neal A. Maxwell. (If a speaker is chosen who has not spoken in General Conference previously, the student is to select a comparable speaker and make a comparison. For example, another speaker of the same gender, language background, ethnicity, etc.)

For consistency and clarity, please put the name of the person or persons whose speeches you are analyzing in the title of your post (For example, "Boldly Brave: The Speaking Style of Spencer W. Kimball" or "Spencer W. Kimball: A Still, Small Voice" or "The Quiet Rhetoric of Spencer W. Kimball" Also, if it is possible, link to the speeches you analyze. If they are not online, be sure to give a proper reference.