the address

So much to say about what got said

articles

Articles

Long-form writing on the history, rhetoric, culture, and data of the American commencement address. Some pieces are published here first; others appear in external publications and are linked below. The archive grows over time — check back, or submit a piece you think belongs here.

All History Analysis Culture Data

The Microphone and the Walkout: Free Speech and the American Commencement

The commencement stage is one of the last places in American life where a single voice speaks to a captive audience. The fights over who gets that microphone touch on deep questions in democratic life.

The Commencement Address: A Brief History of an American Tradition

From Latin orations at colonial colleges to celebrity keynotes today - how this peculiar ritual evolved, and what it reveals about the nation that invented it.

When Did "Passion" Take Over the American Podium?

The word barely appeared in commencement speeches before 1995. By 2010 it was inescapable. A language-pattern investigation into the words that define each era's graduation season.

What the Class of 2001 Was Told — Before Everything Changed

Commencement season 2001 ended in late May, three and a half months before September 11. Reading those speeches now is a quietly disorienting experience.

The Anatomy of a Great Commencement Speech

What separates the speeches people remember from the ones they slept through? A rhetorical breakdown of structure, timing, humor, and the one thing every memorable address has in common.

The Speech That Built Europe: George Marshall at Harvard, 1947

A deep dive into the only commencement address to have directly shaped a geopolitical outcome.

Harvard Magazine