1. From listening to her speech, what does Emma Watson think about gender roles?
2. Do you think this speech is inspiring?
3. Do you think the end of the speech is eff ective? Explain your view, referring to the words Emma uses.
Speech Techniques
Emma Watson opens her speech by greeting her audience and then uses many helpful speech techniques.
❍ Emma Watson’s greeting is: ‘Your Excellencies, UN Secretary General, President of the General Assembly, Executive Director of UN Women and distinguished guests.’
❍ She uses statistics to back up her points, for example: ‘Less than 30 per cent of the audience was male.’
❍ She uses rhetorical questions (questions that do not expect an answer) to emphasise her points. She asks: ‘If not me, who? If not now, when?’
❍ She uses quotes to further back up her opinions: ‘Statesman Edmund Burke said, “All that is needed for the forces of evil to triumph is for good men and women to do nothing.”’
❍ She uses anecdotes to connect with her audience: ‘When I was 8, I was confused with being called bossy because I wanted to direct the plays which we would put on for our parents, but the boys were not.’
