fat_penguin said:
i heard they specified suu kyi a couple of years back.. and they haven't specified in a while - like we were so sure they were gonna specify in our year, but they didn't - i dunno whether that heightens your chances.. =/
but anyway, my teacher said one of her students learnt a selection of speeches - from a range of contexts, and with different themes etc etc
but yeah i was very paranoid, so if you're like me, you can learn a couple of speeches really well, and just learn points for the rest and expand on them when you're in there.. at least you'll have something to write about then
i agree wholeheartedly. its ideal to learn a couple of speeches really really well (i did Socrates, King, Goldman, Havel and Lincoln, and to a certain extent McAleese) and know the others by way of issues, techniques, relevance to our society today, and a couple of good quotes.
i strongly suggest that you learn at least 1 'hard' speech really really well. the 'hard' ones are: cicero, atwood, pearson, suu kyi, mcaleese. not many people will learn these, so u might say u get an 'edge' if you learn these and use them in exams.
a general rule of thumb is learn: 1 historical, 1 commemorative, 1 feminist, 1 racist, 1 of other choosing. this is a really nice 'net' that would cover any 'general' question they throw at you. that is, unless it specifically said to refer to speech X.
i have to admit we had this gigantic fear in 2005 that the HSC WILL specify to refer to a speech, or a range of speeches. so the smart people pretty much learnt all the speeches. some people took a punt and only learnt a few, but really well. in the HSC 2005, NONE WHERE SPECIFIED. u could refer to any speech.
BUT this year, this year...my prediction is that this is THE year, one of those fated years that they WILL ASK. So beware! take care! Better to be safe than sorry! Give yourself a safety net!