Grappling the Two-Point Speech

In the final Estuary of the year we will broach a topic rarely discussed in the extemp world: the two-point speech. The dominant wisdom is so disproportionately oriented toward the traditional three-pronged speech that attention is rarely paid to the other main alternative. Consider this piece a follow-up to my January 16 article, “Beyond Getting Your Bearings.”

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Beyond Getting Your Bearings

As winter break approaches, it is time to start thinking about the second semester and how to fine tune your extemping for another, perhaps more productive half of the season. During this first half, hopefully, you have begun to get your bearings–at whatever level of extemp you are working from–and you have established your goals for year. Now, we devote this first December installment to exploring ways to fine tune and sharpen your extemping–things that will set you apart from the crowd, no matter what level of speaking/extemping you are at.

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Discussing Disasters

The world stands at a critical and defining juncture. In the past year, we have witnessed natural disasters on a magnitude previously unimaginable, given our supposed advancement in technology. We, the thinking goes, ought to have developed the technology–by now–to deal properly with earthquakes, hurricanes and tsunamis, to not be caught with our pants down. But we have been, repeatedly.

For this article, we will primarily discuss issues in focus–in other words, while discussing skills, we will do so by exploring how one deals with these sensitive issues: death, natural disasters and others, like global hunger, poverty and warfare. Please feel free to join the debate by sending us your comments and questions by e-mail and posting here. Thanks!

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Effective Extemp Organization

In this first November edition, the pre-Thanksgiving estuary one might say, we will address issues relating to the filebox, for which I have received several questions about. This is unsurprising: at this time of year, you are beginning to experience first semester fatigue, and one of the ways this manifests itself is in your undesire to file, read and organize your materials. This is understandable. However, filing–effective organization in general–remains one of the most important extemping skills. Thus we will explore this issue more fully.

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New! Improved! “Ich Bin Ein Extemper”!

“Ich Bin Ein Extemper”–once “Extemp Estuary,” then “Ich Bin Ein Extemper,” then Estuary again, and now Extemper again–is moving into vast, uncharted territories…well, not really. Actually, what I mean to say is that this column will be a bi-monthly production due to increasing interest. However, this means you will have to submit your questions as frequently as possible so that we continue to have material to discuss here on the Extemper.

Today, we will primarily discuss questions that do not necessarily have one answer, but instead relate to one’s stylistic preferences. Please feel free to join the debate by posting here!

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Speaking Generally…

Today, this column will turn its focus to something we talked about not long ago: speaking on particular types of topics. Last time, however, we talked about extemping on topics that are particularly broad or sensitive. This time around, I want to focus on topics that are the opposite–in other words, those that deal with issues you have little to nothing on in your file-box.

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Ich Bin Ein Extemper!

“It’s finally fall again–September is in full swing–and I’m sure many of you have already begun the tournament season in earnest,” notes Jesse Nathan in the return of his column. “In that way, it is both one of the more exciting times of year–lots of newness and lots of promise–but also one of the more difficult, since you are in the building process, developing a routine, for example, and a schedule for how you will improve.”

“This month, in fact, I would like to discuss precisely this–developing these habits from the beginning of the year, from the onset of the season, since it will be far easier to maintain such habits if you start them before bad ones have taken root. I will go over several pointers and then briefly answer questions received over the summer and then open it up to anyone who’d be interested in continuing the discussion by sending me an email.”

Continue reading the first installment of this season’s “Extemp Estuary,” which will now appear twice a month.

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