胡静文：皖西学院选手，第17届21世纪杯全国英语演讲比赛三等奖获得者。

自我介绍：我来自江南小城芜湖，性格开朗外向。我热爱语言，作为英语专业的学生，闲暇时间也将德语，法语的学习作为生活的调味剂。英语的学习让我找到了自信，更好地认识了自己，坚定了自己的目标即将来做一名优秀的口译。实习及所获奖项：09年“外研社杯”英语演讲安徽省三等奖。获上海中高级口译证书。校德语演讲一等奖。曾任学校英文主持。

演讲稿：

Ladies and gentlemen,

Ezra Pound once wrote "The apparition of these faces in the crowd; Petals on a wet, black bough." In this poem, we may interest in those imageries like “station, apparition, face, petal, bough” which delicately created by Pound. It seems that they never stop to think why they are in such a hurry. They are indifferent, detached to the society. They don't have destinations, just like apparition. More advanced is tech, but much less is the milk of human kindness, which is Pound’s unique perspective led by humanism to his age. Well, nowadays are we apparition in other’s eyes and what on earth is the role of humanism in today’s technologically advanced world? Positive or negative, as for me, both.

Ladies and gentlemen, then, what does humanism mean to you? Rationalism? Human-oriented beliefs? Yes, these are the major enterprises of the very arena.

Humanism as a social impetus pushes the world forward with the aid of rationalism. Thereby, we shall not merely believe in God, instead, science and technology becomes the major focus. Then human civilizations passed through agricultural society, industrial age, then to information age. I guess that Shakespeare would be astonishingly shocked if he got to know that, we read his masterpieces not by printed book, but by Amazon Kindle.

“It’s in Apple’s DNA that technology alone is not enough — it’s technology married with liberal arts, married with the humanities, that yields us the results that make our heart sing — and nowhere is that more true than in these post-PC devices.” Thanks to Steve Jobs, we are able to obtain such smart iPhones, iPads, etc. Most importantly, our deep appreciation should be ascribed to humanism which really changes the world!

However, that’s the only bright facet of the panorama. Turning back to Pound’s poem again, we can hardly find any nuance of differences between our age and that of his.

Seriously, what does the tech-advanced world bring to us in another sense? Definitely, the apathetic human nature of the times! In 2010, The Yao Jiaxin murder case had captured the attention of the public. Yao knocked down twenty-six year-old mother with his Chevrolet and proceeded to stab the woman 6 times in the chest because she had looked at his license plate. Yao was so indifferent and cruel to other people in such a ruthless way, giving the society a lesson for the reflection of humanity.

With the tempo of high-tech era, by humanism, we are apt to be human-obsessed and care little about the nature. Recently, there exist fierce contradictions between human and nature, to name a few, land desertification, soil erosion, as well as frequent occurrence of natural disasters, etc. Here, the vicious circle emerges, the more unduly human exploit the natural resources, the more retribution that nature will bring to human!

To end my speech, humanism, like a double-edged sword, has its merits and demerits. On one hand, humanism itself is beneficial to the development of technology; on the other hand, if we’re too self-centered and human-focused, it will mislead the world to an unknown, faraway destination.

Thank you!