Public Speaking 101/code talking/steem lingua franca

*On behalf of myself, and the junior champs staff, I want to thank you for being here to celebrate the graduating class of 2019' and in being our parent partners for another successful school year. For junior champs this marks our 11th year and aside from making me feel old, I'm so very appreciative to each and everyone of you for choosing us to teach and your nurture your children. The trust you place in us to be an integral part of your child's growth is never taken for granted, and is the foundation of our progressive learning center.

The smiling faces, laughter, and of course curriculum goals achieved are our shared testimonials.. Tonight, we have gathered together to recognize both the culmination of our cooperative efforts, as well as the individual accomplishments of the class of 2019.. Please give yourselves a hand.

For those of you moving on from our humble school we wish you the very best and will cherish the time we spent together. For all of you that we will be seeing us again in 2020 we look forward to a bright vision of the future and can't wait to continue our mutual growth. For now, let us all reflect on the abundance of tender, loving, care that fills this room and the positivity that no four walls can ever contain. Without further adieu I'd like to introduce the 2019 graduates and allow them to entertain us all for the rest of the evening.. Thank You*

Every time I'm asked to speak in public I get excited. It wasn't always this way though. When I was in school I used to get very nervous, not so much that I wasn't able to pull off a decent oration, but I certainly didn't enjoy the process. At some point after the awkward teen years and with the help of two very good instructors I began to enjoy writing and giving speeches.

I have absolutely broken rule number one in the above speech-which is to know your audience-im well aware that my graduation speech for a kindergarten is far too politician slick, and dare I say presidential.. I'm intentionally not diluting the prose or using any informal colloquialisms as I've grown quite tired of watering down all of my English in an effort to assimilate. Plus, one of the major selling points of our school is that we can offer english, or more specifically "American english" from a native speaker. My goals aren't to de-Malaysianize anyone but I do wish to provide an awareness that regional accents and incorrect grammar or slang aren't widely accepted in the professional world.

By the time I was about 5 years old I'd picked up on the differences between my southern and northern families accents and purposely sought to develop a more non-dialect way of speaking. I did this because I assume I saw how people were judged based on their different speech patterns and dialects and I wanted to be free from those boxes and labels.

This brings up the concept of code talking which is either a conscious or even subconscious behavioural trait exhibited by people when communicating with an intelligible but different dialect of their native tongue. This is a complex mechanism that includes the use of slang and even broken English if one is surrounded by non native or informally educated speakers. In this context one can argue that whilst many Americans only know the English language, they might posses an uncanny ability to speak in various informal conversational tones that are unique to specific regions, ethnicities, cultures, and even timelines if accounting for a propensity to use historical or dated terms as well as the new urban dictionary style of linguistics.

This capacity to code talk is further advanced in places like Malaysia where nearly all people are fluent in a minimum of 3 languages. Each of which has its own set of rules and traditions to be adhered to OR broken depending on the situation. This is no doubt a global phenomenon and an unintended consequence of our modern world. In the very recent past many societies speakers would have lived their entire lives only exposed to the language they were born into..

I'm running out of time and you're probably wondering what's the point here? The point is, I think it's extremely important to keep the unique languages and the cultures they represent intact, but I also understand the life long pursuit that is involved in the mastery of a language. Currently English is the lingua franca in the vast majority of the world with mandarin being fresh on its heels. Therefore, I would stress the importance of choosing one of the two languages to attempt to excel at, without losing the love and passion for one's own mother tongue. Thus, I've decided to write a speech that in no way shape, form, or fashion assumes anything about the audience's abilities to understand the language. It's the exact same speech I'd make in middle America and while this might challenge a non native English speaker that's ultimately the point.

Hell, most Americans are very poor when in comes to their abilities in English and part of the reason for this is because they've been spoken to in a manner that assumes they can't grasp much above an 8th grade level. So, please I hope no one feels I'm being a language elitist. I'm still learning English myself and I know you're doing the same, as English is the preferred language of steem. I see a fabulous use case for steem being an international language center as a forward thinking progressive multi national platform..

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