LEAD 16
Speechwriting as Craft and Career Winter 2020

Cross-listed PSCI 16
This is not the current course catalog

Whether your ideal is Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., telling Americans “I have a dream” or Ronald Reagan ordering Mikhail Gorbachev to “tear down this wall!”, speeches can change cultures or minds, move a nation or a single human heart. This writing-intensive course will introduce you to the history and importance of speechwriting and rhetoric, provide you with direct experience writing and delivering speeches, and introduce you to career possibilities in speechwriting and related fields. Our course materials, professional guests and class discussions will consider diverse rhetorical traditions within the U.S. and around the world. The modern profession of speechwriting involves much more than writing remarks for someone using a podium or teleprompter. It may include developing a TED Talk, producing a video, writing social media posts or ghostwriting op-eds and even memoirs (!). That’s because speechwriters at their best are more than writers: They’re trusted advisors on the art of persuasive communication, and of leadership more generally. Whether you want to develop your own public speaking skills or write for a politician, CEO, or cultural leader, this class will teach you about poetics, persuasion, and the pretty peculiar principles involved in writing words that another human being will be credited (or blamed) for-not to mention a sense of the career opportunities in politics, education, the arts and industry. The course will meet 3x/week for 2 hours at a time. Work outside class-including readings, film viewings, writing assignments and associated research, rehearsal of speeches, etc.-will require another 20 hours per week. During the course all students will be expected to write and deliver multiple speeches. Adjunct Instructor Bio: Jim Reisch is Chief Communications Officer at Williams College.