Debating is an art form, isn’t it? Unfortunately great orators and polemicists are becoming a bit of a dying breed. Say what you will about Christopher Hitchens, for example. He was indeed a controversial speaker. You may certainly agree or disagree with his opinions. You may consider his political and philosophical views debatable or even offensive but one undeniable fact is that he was exceedingly articulate. He made clear points and gave his opponents plenty of food for thought. I sometimes have the feeling that over the years speech-writing and speaking skills in general have yielded the stage to emotions and beliefs and, more recently, to "post-truths" and alternative facts. These days speeches tend to be mostly about “connecting with the audience” and much less about articulating a coherent discourse with cold facts, persuasive arguments and informed opinions. But I digress…

Be that as it may, in our courses (B2 and C1) we are only expected to politely agree and disagree, show support and question our interlocutor’s points, which is no small feat in itself. I'm afraid that the ability to be funny, aggressive, pompous, vulgar or creative is truly beyond our scope. So let’s keep it simple by considering an easy subject matter.

The video below these lines shows a (deliberately) shallow approach to a commonplace issue: national stereotypes. Why have I chosen such a trite topic? Because I’m convinced that both upper-intermediate (B2) and advanced students (C1) should first master the obvious statements before they can move on to more versatile forms of expression. The girl in the video is in some ways an over-the-top version of an average American (her hand movements, her enthusiastic mannerisms, her facial expressions are a little on the nose) but, in terms of vocabulary, she offers gold to learners of English. Let me tell you why.

To start with, she uses many B2 level expressions, for instance, “to get to know each other and figure things out”. Pay attention to how she phrases an obvious statement “Germans can often be quite direct”. She resorts to a generalization but she doesn’t say “In my opinion Germans are direct”, which would sound too blunt. Before plunging into a sweeping statement she is smart enough to mention another platitude: “everyone is different and unique but…”.

There is a good deal of C1 stuff as well: “looking back on it…”. Check out the idiomatic phrases: “As an American I’m used to beating around the bush about things, softening the blow…”. All in all, I find this video quite practical for those of you that want to incorporate “standard expressions” into a conversation that (let’s face it) we are all bound to have from time to time.