Severn Speech: Content
Conventions of public awareness speeches: What consequences of environmental destruction did Severn bring her audience’s attention to? Name THREE consequences.
ANY THREE:
Starving children
Animals dying across this planet
Holes in the ozone
Air pollution / Chemicals in the air
Water pollution
Animals and plants going extinct
Factual: According to Severn, why should adults “stop breaking” the environment?
They don’t know how to “fix” or repair the destruction of the environment
Factual: What does Severn suggest that money from Western countries can be used to do?
finding environmental answers, ending poverty and finding treaties
What consequences of environmental destruction does she expand or extend over the course of the speech? How does she develop these ideas?
deforestation, pollution, greenhouse gases, the destruction/extinction of animal and plant species, the waste and greed in our society, children living in poverty
using her own experience / anecdotes: life in Canada, time spent with Brazilian children living on the streets
Factual: What is Severn Suzuki’s main argument for world leaders?
For world leaders to make the world a better place for her generation / to stop destruction of the earth’s resources
Factual: What are the premises for adults “stop breaking” the environment, regarding Western countries?
Western countries consume too much and waste resources
People in the Western world are not willing to share; poor children in Rio would be generous
Conventions of public awareness speeches: Severn urges adults to “make (their) actions reflect (their) words”. What “actions” is she referring to?
Allocating money to finding environmental answers, ending poverty and finding treaties
Stopping the destruction of the environment
Vocabulary: Find a word that means “very great in amount, scale, or intensity”.
Tremendous
Inference: What is Severn Cullis-Suzuki’s tone regarding adults’ hypocrisy?
condemning
Reorganisation: Explain the hypocrisy of adults in Severn’s speech.
The adults tell children to clean up their mess and not hurt other creatures but do the exact opposite of that to the environment.
Reorganisation: What ideas from the beginning of her speech are included or expanded in her conclusion?
To change the ways they (adults) behave / act differently
Is Severn Suzuki engaging in a “soft” sell or “hard” sell of her ideas? What specific language signals this? Does she succeed?
hard sell
the use of modal verbs of high modality / certainty