Reality Check
“You are not special. You are not exceptional.”
Anaphora
“3.2 million seniors are graduating”
Logos / statistics
“Neither can Donald Trump… which someone should tell him”
Sarcasm
“But why limit ourselves to high school?”
Rhetorical question
“Dream big. Work hard. Think for yourself.”
Commanding Languadge
“pampered, cosseted, doted upon, helmeted, bubble-wrapped”
List or Loaded Diction
“37,000 valedictorians… 37,000 class presidents”
Repetition
“2,185,967 pairs of Uggs.”
Hyperbole
“Imagine… watching sixty-eight hundred yous go running by.”
Visual Imagery
“Climb the mountain”
Metaphor
“numbers even an English teacher can’t ignore”
Self-deprecating humor
“92,000 harmonizing altos… 340,000 swaggering jocks”
Enumeration
“I am allowed to say Needham, yes?”
Rehtorical Question
“your planet… is not the center… your solar system… is not the center”
Parallelism
“Climb it so you can see the world, not so the world can see you.”
Antithesis
“If everyone gets a trophy, trophies become meaningless.”
Aphorism or just say its a memorable short statement.
“even if you’re one in a million… nearly 7,000 people just like you”
“although the hair is quite a phenomenon” - refering to donal trump
Satire or Irony
“your planet… your solar system… your galaxy”
Anaphora
“selflessness is the best thing you can do for yourself”
Paradox