Ted Talk: Sarah Kay

Summary:
Sarah Kay starts this talk with one of her spoken word poems, called "If I Should Have a Daughter." In this poem, she outlines all of the qualities she would want to teach her daughter to have, which include being creative, accepting of the heartbreaks of life, asking meaningful questions, and loving the world around her. After she delivers this powerful poem, she explains what the art of spoken word poetry is, and how she writes poems to figure out things about the world and herself.

Then, she goes into explaining her journey with spoken word poetry, from being a nervous high schooler just figuring out how to perform at a poetry bar to running Project Voice with a fellow spoken word poet. This project, as she describes is, uses spoken word poetry to entertain, educate, and inspire students around the country and world. Through this project, she also teaches these students to discover the wonder of life and feel emotions rather than attempting to be cool. This brings across one of her main messages of the talk, which is to be yourself, in whatever version feels the most comfortable to you. She implies that by doing this, you can develop a perspective and way of thinking that is uniquely yours, that no one can take away from you, and that others can learn from if you have the courage to share. This idea of sharing your thoughts and emotions is Sarah's second main message, as she conveys that by opening up to the people around us, perhaps through spoken word, we are able to relate to one another and grow as a community.

The third main message that Sarah gives in this talk is to continue to grow as a person and push yourself further, and to never settle when things get comfortable. She describes how we all see the world as a curious, wonderful place as children, and how by continuing to work on ourselves and what we know to be true, we can discover this wonder again.

Lastly, Sarah closes with a second powerful poem, this one about the idea that all things come to an end, that we should make the most of life, and what to do with the concept of the impossible.

How she gets these points across:

• Pathos
• Sarah continuously appeals to her audience's emotions throughout her talk, specifically when she is performing her spoken word poetry. This is because when she is performing, her body language and facial expressions show a whole variety of emotions that people both relate to and react to. By showing her emotions so openly, she prompts the audience to feel something in return, and empathize with her. In this case, her use of pathos is extremely effective, as I related to many emotions she described and felt more captivated by her messages. 
• Ethos
• In this talk, she sets up her credibility as a spoken word poet by first performing a powerful spoken word, which proves that she is accomplished in this field and has a unique way of thinking that the audience can learn from.  She continues to build this credibility by describing how long she has been performing poetry, and how she runs a project that revolves around using spoken word poetry to teach and inspire students around the world. I think that the most important part of her using ethos in this talk is by showing the audience first hand how beautiful and relatable spoken word can be. 
• Logos
• Logic is used in this talk through the idea that there are certain things that people know to be true, and other things that people know nothing about. By setting up her audience with this framework, she is able to clearly and accurately describe how anyone and everyone can write meaningful poetry, as we all have our own stories and ideas to tell. In addition to this, she also uses logic in the way she structures this talk. First, she draws people in with a powerful poem, then she explains her spoken word journey in three distinct parts with a lesson coming from each part, and then she concludes with another powerful spoken word poem. These five parts each play a distinct role in portraying who she is as a poet and what she wants the audience to take away from her talk. The only main flaws I can see is that she could explicitly have broadened her messages to apply to more than just spoken word poetry, though I understand her bias towards spoken word as it is her career and passion. 

My relationship to the talk:

If I should have a daughter, I would want to teach her to think outside of the box and not be afraid to share her talents with the world, similar to how Sarah Kay does in this Ted Talk. I first stumbled upon this video in sixth grade, when I was going through the period on my life where I was convinced I would grow up to be an author or poet. In only five minutes, she became my new role model, and I became engrossed in her metaphors, messages, and in the way she conveyed emotion. She could do everything I had ever wanted to do and more. So when presented with this blog post, I knew without a doubt that I had to analyze this talk that inspired and challenged me at such a critical point in my life. More than this, there is something about her words that really connect and resonate with me. They made me feel like my intertwining thought processes were understood, and that not everything has to make sense in this world. In watching this Ted Talk, I think that I understood for the first time that there was beauty to not knowing something and in the process of trying to figure it out. Not knowing is, after all, a big part of being human, as we all try to find our own answers in our unique journeys of life.