Raundy Pausch

Raundy Pausch

The lecture focused on three main things. Pausch’s childhood dreams, enabling the dreams of others, and how to achieve one’s goals or enable the dream of others. The speech aimed at encouraging the audience to do good to others, especially the needy. Raundy Pausch is a professor of Computer science. He took an undergraduate degree in computer science at Brown in 1982. He holds a Ph.D. in computer science from Carnegie Mellon in 1988. He taught at the University of Virginia, where he was granted tenure a year early. Joined the Carnegie Mellon faculty in 1997 with appointments in the CS, HCI, and design departments. He is also the author or co-author of five books and reviewed over 60 journals. He is dedicated to making the world a better place by influencing students, philanthropic acts, creating organizations, and bridging cultures.

Randy Pausch has used gestures very well in his speech. For example, to prove his physical wellness, he does press-ups on the ground. His use of tone is excellent. He raises the voice whenever necessary and lowers it as well. His movements during the lecture are very crucial in making the audience attentive. He is very humorous, and the audience keeps laughing. He also maintains good eye contact with the audience as a way of making monitoring the audience.

Main points covered by Pausch talks about his childhood dreams, and how he has enabled others’ vision. He highlights his childhood dreams, which fascinates the audience. He had dreamt of playing in the NFL, being Captain Kirk, authoring an article in the World Book encyclopedia, among others. He talks about his shattered dreams, but he also states his professional legacy as “Alice.” This involves helping millions of kids have fun while learning something hard. He is satisfied with his legacy. In the third part of his speech, Pausch brings the subject of what made him achieve his dreams. He states the role of mentors, parents, and students. He is so thankful to his parents, mother, and dad for his life. He says that his father was full of life. Possibly his father’s works of charity and humanity are what shaped him to be who she is. His father is a role model for him. He states how his parents helped needy children to go to school. The point learned here is to help others. This is something that every human being should do. The other aspect that Pausch brings about is “never give up.” This is one of the essential words of encouragement from the speaker.

Another point is “how to get people to help you.” You can’t get there alone, Pausch believes in Karma. Here, the speaker emphasizes the need of other people in our lives. He encourages us to see the importance of other people in our lives. Other points that Pausch has stressed in his speech include: telling the truth, being earnest, apologizing whenever you err, and focusing on others, not yourself.

Randy Pausch has used pathos (appeal to emotion) in convincing his audience of his worst experiences in life. When he talks about chemotherapy, he arouses feelings of pity because he must have been sick of cancer. He states that chemotherapy was the worst thing in his life. Here, the speaker accomplished the use of pathos because he arouses the feelings of sickness and disease. We all feel sorry for a sick person, don’t we? Chemotherapy is a treatment of cancer, and when the speaker talks about it, the audience is in a somber mood. He also brings feelings of sorrow and mourning when he talks about the death of his father. This is why the audience remains quiet when he narrates the death of his father. Usually, the death of a person arouses feelings of sadness, sorrow, and pity. The speaker has, therefore, accomplished the use of pathos by telling the audience about the death of his father.

Randy Pausch accomplished the use of ethos in his lecture by his profession. The fact that he is a professor makes his audience believe what he says. He uses the credibility of being a doctor to convince his audience in the speech.

The speech made me think about others and not me alone. The speech reminded me to focus on others and not me alone. The speech has affected me in that I have started thinking about others. I have also learned to apologize whenever I make a mistake and to be honest every time.

Yes, when the speaker talked about his childhood dreams, this resonated with me. He reminded me of my childhood dreams too.  When I was a child, I had a lot of things in my wish list, which did not come to pass. I wished to be a footballer, a musician, and a doctor. Today am an engineer. So when the speaker was talking about his case, my childhood wishes resonated in my mind.