6.3 What If You Draw a Blank? — Stand up, Speak out
6.3 What If You Draw a Blank? — Stand up, Speak out
6.3 What If You Draw a Blank?
Learning Objectives
- Understand and conduct a basic personal inventory.
- Explain how to identify and use finding aids for topic selection.
- Examine the importance of polling one’s audience to determine speech topics.
Babak Fakhamzadeh – Head scratcher – CC BY-NC 2.0.
Uh-oh, what if you have no clue what to speak about at all? Thankfully, there are many places where you can get help finding a good topic for you. In this section, we’re going to talk about a range of ways to find the best topic.
Conduct a Personal Inventory
The first way to find a good topic is to conduct what we call a personal inventory. A personal inventory is a detailed and descriptive list about an individual. In this case, we want you to think about you. Here are some basic questions to get you started:
- What’s your major?
- What are your hobbies?
- What jobs have you had?
- What extracurricular activities have you engaged in?
- What clubs or groups do you belong to?
- What political issues interest you?
- Where have you traveled in life?
- What type of volunteer work have you done?
- What goals do you have in life?
- What social problems interest you?
- What books do you read?
- What movies do you watch?
- What games do you play?
- What unique skills do you possess?
After responding to these questions, you now have a range of areas that are unique to you that you could realistically develop into a speech. Here are some unique inventory items that could be turned into speeches for some of the authors of this textbook:
Richard A. Welter
- Grew up as an air force dependent and lived on the island of Crete
- Is a puppeteer
- Has two puggles (half pug/half beagle) named Daikin and Teddy
Edith D. Cates
- Worked as a teacher for the Medicine Chief of the Bear Tribe Medicine Society in Spokane, Washington
- Was codirector of Bear Tribe Publishing Company
- Specializes in storytelling
Bess E. Rigsby
- Is an avid fan of the Baltimore Orioles
- Spent a month in South Korea as part of a study/travel group
- Is a history buff who likes visiting historic sites and national parks
Carl N. Cundiff
- Briefly lived in the Dominican Republic with his family as a young boy
- Is a DJ
- Occasionally practices yoga
We wanted to note these interesting facts about our personal lives to illustrate the fact that each and every one of us has done unique and interesting things in our lives that could make really interesting and informative, persuasive, or entertaining speeches.
Use Finding Aids
If you’re still just stumped after conducting a personal inventory, the next recommendation we have for helping you find a good topic is to use a finding aid. A finding aid is a tool that will help you find lists of possible topics. Let’s look at four of them: best-seller lists, organizations that tally information, media outlets, and the Internet.
Best-Seller Lists
A best-seller list is a list of books that people are currently b