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Transcript

Steve Jobs Commencement Speech

By Christian Davenport

Closing

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In the end of the speech, Jobs continued from his idea of how death brings new progression into the world and brought up how when he was a kid, he used to read a catalog called The Whole Earth Catalog.

"then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue...it was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: “Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.” It was their farewell message as they signed off". Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you."

Steve made it very personal here by saying "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish" as his was words to the graduating class by symbolizing the death of one time and the birth of a new age of young people going into the world.

Rhetorical Strategies

Steve Jobs mainly used his own real life stories and examples to:

  • Make it very personal
  • Establishes connection to audience
  • Make listeners feel emotional

Back Ground

Main Ideas

Steve Jobs is the wide know creator of the Apple company and Pixar animation studio. He dropped out of college to create his first computer in his garage. At the time of his death he was worth around $31.6 billion. He was very successful and was chosen to give a commencement speech, ironically, at the University of Stanford, the college he dropped out of.

Steve Jobs had 3 main ideas in his speech that he used his own life experiences to use as evidence for his topics. By doing this, he was able to reach the audience in a special way. Jobs was able to give the new graduates good advice for their future after college.

Main Idea 3

Main Idea 1

In using this story of how he went to college the audience's college, he was able to establish a connection with the students and was able to add credibility to his speech

By sharing this dark time in his life, Jobs was able to have the audience create an emotional connection to reach them further and it made the speech even more "realistic" by setting a life check in the listener's minds

Lastly, Jobs teaches the lesson of living life to the fullest and "Live every day like your last"

Jobs first main idea was on the idea of that is you can't go forwards in life, you have to take steps back before you can go further in the future

"Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backward. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life."

"I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?” And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something."

"Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life."

Steve Jobs used the example of how he dropped out of college but took drop in classes that interested him. he took a calligraphy class soon after dropping out. At first he didn't think that he would ever use this knowledge in his future "But 10 years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac". If he never took that class we would have never had different fonts. This shows that sometimes our step backs will help us out in the future

Jobs shared his heart touching story of when he found out that he had cancer in his pancreas. When he found out he was shook and went home to his wife and kids with his diagnosis on his mind. But when he went to the doctor, they found out he had a rare type of Pancreatic cancer that could be cured with surgery. Jobs later had surgery and didn't have any more cancer. During this ordeal. This made Jobs appreciate life more and showed him the importance of death in progress of the world

Main Idea 2

Sometimes it takes pain, heartbreak, and loss before things in life get better. "Don't lose faith" and to find what you love

"It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don’t lose faith. I’m convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work."

By using this part in his life, he was able to reach the audience in a way to make them sympathize for Jobs because of losing his creation.

Jobs in this part of the essay talked about the time he got fired from Apple, his own creation due to disagreement with the other co-owners. Jobs didn't stop and continued on to create two companies called NeXT and Pixar. Both were hugely successful and Apple ended up buying NeXT and Jobs was soon back in the Apple business. Jobs shows us not to stop then there are bumps in the road and to continue on the path that we love to be on.

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