When offering definitions, competent speakers remember that words have connotative meanings—emotional meanings—
Most informative speeches require that the speaker define a term or clarify an idea at some point (see “Clarifying Concepts” in the next section for more discussion). For some topics, however, the entire speech is focused on definitions. The main goal of definitional speeches is to provide answers to “what” questions. Such questions as “What is torture?” and “What is marriage?” have prompted heated debate in the halls of Congress (and elsewhere) in recent years, making it clear that an entire speech could easily be devoted to defining such complex ideas. When you define something, you identify its essential qualities and meaning. Following are various ways to do this, and a definitional speech often incorporates more than one of these techniques.
As noted, definitional speeches can take one or more of these ap-