Welcome to the “Servant Speaking” website featuring video and audio clips of speeches such as:

* Clifford Stoll’s entertaining criticisms of teachers who overuse PowerPoint™

* Commencement addresses by Jon Stewart (William & Mary) and Bono (Harvard)

* Lauren Winner’s speech on "real sex."

Do these and other speakers truly serve their audiences? That’s for you to decide.

Each clip includes questions based on servant speaking principles developed in my paperback book An Essential Guide to Public Speaking. College instructors across North America are using this website with the book. If you're an instructor, send me an email to find out about course materials available via a password-protected website.

I hope to encourage people of faith to enter the public realm with faith, skill, and virtue. We need faith beyond our own ability since public speaking can be scary and is always somewhat uncertain. We need skill to speak wisely and well. And we need virtue to be speakers of good character – gentle, kind, peaceful, patient, and more.

In the Hebrew and Christian traditions, especially the writings of the rhetorician St. Augustine, the God-given purpose for public speaking is to love the audience as neighbor. Why should we learn to speak well? In order to serve our audience – to be servant speakers. In today's world, where words are intentionally misused and where so many public persons are uncivil and even untruthful, we need to work together to reclaim the art of servant speaking.

Special thanks to Courtney Schutt, Scott Tanis, Krista Spahr, Emily Brondsema and others at the Digital Studio at Calvin College for their excellent work on this site. I hope this resource will help you serve others with faith, skill, and virtue.

Gratefully,

Quentin J. Schultze
Arthur H. DeKruyter Chair in Faith and Communication
Calvin College, Grand Rapids, MI USA