There are
many occasions when you can find yourself speaking to an
audience. These can range from report to club members to
a formal talk or lecture at a professional gathering.
Whatever the occasion you want information be of
interest and remembered.
Humor can help you achieve
both goals. Now this is not the same as giving humorous
talk. That is a most difficult speech to deliver
effectively, requiring a special talent and skill. These
tips have to do with the use of humor in your
presentations, whatever these may be, to help make your
points clear and remembered.
Everything that said in my previous article, Humor -
Tips for Using it in Everyday Conversation, also applies
to using humor in speeches. But public or platform
speaking at is sometimes called does have some
additional considerations. Almost every professional
speechwriter agrees on what the important ones are.
First
You are speaking to present an idea or discuss a
subject. Use only those jokes or bits of humor that help
you do that. A funny story that has nothing to do with
your subject won't help you or your audience. Often a
person is inclined to begin a presentation with a joke
or humorous story. Your are immediately on shaky ground
when you do. You have, in effect, a stand-alone bit of
humor. It may or may not get the laugh you want. If the
audience does not laugh, then you've lost that moment of
initial interest audiences always give a speaker.
One way to overcome this risk is making sure your
opening story has a point so strong that even if the
laugh does not come, you can continue immediately
focusing on the point of your story.
Second
With humor you can actually make a point three times.
You make your statement, follow it with your joke to
highlight or illustrate what you just said, then you
restate your original point. Three times you made your
point: Your statement, the illustrative joke, a
restatement. The listener, in recalling the humor at a
future time, also recalls the point associated with it.
One comedy-writing technique to help you fit a story
to your subject is called "Switching." You can change
either the build up or the punch line for it to fit your
subject matter.
Example of changing the build up:
Original:
Neighbor: Do you like your new sister, Tommy?
Tommy: Oh yes, but there are lots of things we needed
more.
Switched:
Friend: I hear your mother married again. Do you like
your new father?
Tommy: He's all right, but there's lots of things we
needed more.
Example of changing the punch line:
Original:
Desperate panhandler: Lady, I haven't eaten in four
days.
Rich lady: Young man, you must learn to force
yourself.
Switched:
Panhandler: Lady, I haven't eaten in four days. Can
you help me.
Rich Lady: Certainly. I recommend The Ritz, a
wonderful restaurant on 14th Street.
Take time to practice switching jokes. Beside being
fun, it will expand your story file.
Third
Try to personalize and localize your stories. Instead
of saying "a man" and "a city" give the man and the city
names that the audience recognizes. If you can use their
locale and people in the audience, so much the better.
Work yourself into the joke as though you saw it happen,
and if you can become the fall guy, better still.
They'll love you for it.
Fourth
When your joke has quotes, deliver them in the style
of the jokes above. Do not say, "He's all right," said
Tommy, "But there's lots of things we needed more".
That's OK in writing, but in speaking it slows down the
story.
With a practice you can make amusing stories funny
ones. (c) Cy Eberhart 2006
As a hospital chaplain Cy Eberhart, (now retired) was
a firsthand witness to the entire spectrum of human
emotions: personal successes and failures; the deepest
despairs and the great peaks of joy. Two questions
remained foremost in his mind: How was it that some
could find inner strengths that brought courage and hope
and others could not? What was to be learned from these
experiences that would have a positive and creative
effect for daily, routine living?
His lectures, writings, workshops, book
"In the Presence of Humor"
and his living-history Stand Up Comedys of America's famed
humorist
Will Rogers
offers some of the answers.
http://cyeberhart.com/
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