Malala Yousafzai - Nobel Peace Prize speech of a talented young woman

On July 12, 1997, Malala Yousafzai was born in Mingora, Pakistan, located in the country's Swat Valley. For the first few years of her life, her hometown remained a popular tourist spot that was known for its summer festivals. However, the area began to change as the Taliban tried to take control.
In October 2014, Yousafzai received the Nobel Peace Prize, along with Indian children's rights activist Kailash Satyarthi. At age 17, she became the youngest person to receive the Nobel Peace Prize. In congratulating Yousafzai, Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif said: “She is (the) pride of Pakistan, she has made her countrymen proud. Her achievement is unparalleled and unequaled. Girls and boys of the world should take lead from her struggle and commitment."

 Malala held a pleasant speech on 10 December 2014 in Oslo.

But in which did she speak to the people? Why do we think that this speech was so incredible? The answer is an easy one: Aristotle. 2300 years ago, Aristotle wrote down the «secret to being a persuasive speaker», the secret which forms the basis for nearly every public speaking book written since then. Ethos, Pathos and Logos are the «magic» words.

Ethos is about to convince an audience to accept anything you say and they have to accept you as credible. Ethos is your level of credibility as perceived by your audience. Malala has definitely credibility because she presentes herself as a grateful person, f. ex. «Thank you to everyone for your continued support and love», «I would like to thank my parents for their unconditional love.», «I am also honoured to receive this award together with Kailash Satyarthi, who has been a champion for children's rights for a long time.». She is also establishing connection with audience when she said «dear brothers and sisters». This is her recognizable way to speak to her audience. Malala has also credibility because she is someone who has stood up against extremists, as a representative of many, «We survived. And since that day, our voices have grown louder and louder.I tell my story, not because it is unique, but because it is not. It is the story of many girls.»

 Pathos is the quality of a persuasive presentation which appeals to the emotions of the audience. Emotional connection can be created in many ways by a speaker, perhaps most notably by stories. «One of my very good school friends, the same age as me, who had always been a bold and confident girl, dreamed of becoming a doctor. But her dream remained a dream. [...]» This is one example of some stories Malala told in her Nobel Peace Prize speech. In the end of her speech, she mentions things she want people to do now and she did this in an emotional way, so that people really get inspired by her, «Let us become the first generation to decide to be the last , let us become the first generation that decides to be the last that sees empty classrooms, lost childhoods, and wasted potentials.»

 The last one of the three persuasive appeals is Logos. It is synonymous with a locigal argument. Does the message makes sense? And is the mesage based on facts, statistics and evidence? «Many children in countries like Pakistan and India, as Kailash Satyarthi mentioned, many children, especially in India and Pakistan are deprived of their right to education because of social taboos, or they have been forced into child marriage or into child labour.» Malala said many examples which underpinned her arguments to change the world from the way it is now to a better one. «We still see conflicts in which innocent people lose their lives and children become orphans. We see many people becoming refugees in Syria, Gaza and Iraq. In Afghanistan, we see families being killed in suicide attacks and bomb blasts.»

 Malala Yousafzai managed to spread her message out into the world because her speech was effective and powerful. That is what counts. Having the passion and the volition to speak out to people and to bring such a message across. Malala is a talent, a survivor and of course the youngest Nobel Peace Prize of all time.

 

(link to picture source)

A TED talk

Our new topic in international English will be «Global issues» and I watched a talk about a global issues on the website TED.

The topic of the talk is «Don’t insist on English» and the speaker’s name is Patricia Ryan. The video was filmed in December 2010 at TEDxDubai. In her talk, she asks a provocative question: Is the world's focus on English preventing the spread of great ideas in other languages?

Patricia Ryan talks about language loss and the globalization of English. She tells us that it is important to be able to communicate across generations and to get much knowledge of older family members, for example. Ryan points out that a language dies every 14 days and English is the undisputed global language at the same time. She has seen a lot of changes in her career as a English teacher in foreign countries. The major change that she have seen was how teaching English has morphed from being a mutually beneficial practice to becoming a massive business that it is today. Patricia could literally see how it changed. She also tell us about a test one has to pass if you are not a native speaker but you want to study in the U.K. or in the U.S. Ryan mentions that English teachers are the gatekeepers; you have to satisfy them first before you can go on. She thinks that „it can be dangerous to give too much power to a narrow segment of society.“ She is against using English as a barrier and tells that we need more than 600 languages and the main one being English, (or Chinese). Millions and millions of students take these tests every year and have to pay a fee for that. But they are prohibitive to so many millions of poor people. Patricia Ryan also points out that people focus on English because they want to give their children the best chance in life and to do that, they need a so called „Western education“. Later she talks a little bit about cooperation between languages and that we can achieve and learn so much more if we do pay also attention to other languages in addition to English. „When a language dies, we don’t know what we lose with that language.“

Her last words of her talk are: „Let us celebrate diversity. Mind your language. Use it to spread great ideas.“

I chose this specific talk because I think that language is a very interesting topic, it is a big part of everyone’s culture and therefor an issue worth talking about.

I believe that language is a part of everybody and we have to appreciate it as often as we can. Surely, English is a really important world language and it is also useful in business and career life. But learning other languages besides English and being proud of his own one has also good advantages.

Most interesting aspect for me is that every 14 days a language, which is spoken somewhere on our great earth, dies. I cannot imagine that my own language will not exist longer one day.

Esteem your mother tongue but also don’t forget that English is a global languages which accompanies us every single day.
 

LINK TO THE TALK

Short movie review - Gran Torino

The film we watched last time in English is called Gran Torino and it was produced in 2008. It is an US-American movie and the director is Clint Eastwood who also plays one of the main characters, named Walt Kowalski, in the movie. Other main actors are Bee Vang (Tao), Ahney Her (Sue), Christopher Carley (Father Janovich), Chee Thao (Grandma) and Choua Kue (Youa).

The story takes place in a neighbourhood of Detroit where many people with multiculturalism background are living.

Kowalski is an embittered Korean War veteran, whose prize possession is a 1972 Gran Torino, and he is also a work-a-day man, who is emotionally distant from his two sons and their families. His wife has recently passed away and the neighbourhood they have lived in for years has changed dramatically. Now his neighbours represent various cultures, much different than his own and for the cantankerous, and some times, racist, Kowalski, it is almost more than he can take. A conflict arises between Kowalski and his Hmong neighbours (many Hmong people fled to the United States from Vietnam, Thailand and Laos immediately after the Vietnam War). However, the conflict results in Kowalski inadvertently becoming involved in the lives of the two Hmong young people, brother and sister, Tao and Sue. After some time he gradually takes Tao under his wing, teaching him a few things about life and helps getting him a job. When a local gang begins relentlessly harassing Tao and Sue, Kowalski cannot simply stand by and watch; this time he intentionally becomes involved.

The film illustrates town members forcing to make a choice as to which popular culture they will follow.  They can follow a path of religion and live peacefully or they can choose a path of constant feuding by joining a gang.  Either way, the town has become divided and both opposing cultures seem to be constituted as a popular lifestyle.

The movie Gran Torino gives a lot of attention to cultural differences. Especially the initial cultural conflict between Walt Kowalski and the Hmong people in his neighbourhood plays a huge role in the film. It is a good pictured example for multiculturalism and multicultural society because there are living people from different cultures in one street and they have to adapt and to respect each other to have a working relationship and living together.

 

The picture is published on the webside www.entertainmentnutz.com