Tom Hanks
Actor
Tom Hanks delivers a humorous, wide-ranging address noting the near-equal balance of progress and decline over recent decades, illustrated by decade-by-decade comparisons. He argues that fear has become a marketable, distracting force in modern life and contrasts it with faith in self-determination, urging graduates to choose faith over fear. He closes by calling on graduates to serve returning Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans by helping them transition back to civilian life.
“fear at your back faith in front of you which way will you lean which way will you move move forward move every forward”
Key moments
- 01 Joking about technology, social media, and viral fame
- 02 Comparing the world's progress and decline across recent decades
- 03 Critiquing fear as a profitable commodity in news and culture
- 04 Telling a parable about three fearful pilgrims and a wise man
- 05 Urging graduates to serve returning veterans
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Tom Hanks at Yale, 2011
A Class Day address about choosing faith over fear, serving returning veterans, practicing civic empathy, and acting before certainty arrives.
Speech arc
- 01Old Campus
Opening move
- 02Comic opening
Speech beat
- 03Fear named
Speech beat
- 04Faith chosen
Speech beat
- 05Veterans
Speech beat
- 06Four-year charge
Speech beat
- 07Daily courage
Speech beat
- 08World repair
Final charge
Opening: Humor makes room for a serious civic claim
Hanks begins with Class Day levity, pop culture, and the noisy present, then pivots toward the emotional force that can shrink public courage: fear.
Ceremony
Jokes about the day keep the address conversational before the moral stakes sharpen.
Distraction
The speech names a world of noise, devices, predictions, and anxious headlines that can scatter attention.
Pivot
Comedy does not cancel seriousness; it lets the class hear a direct argument about courage.
Hanks begins with Class Day levity, pop culture, and the noisy present, then pivots toward the emotional force that can shrink public courage: fear.
Choice: Every day asks fear or faith
The center of the address is a repeated decision. Fear delays, narrows, and isolates; faith gives graduates a practical engine for creativity, movement, and responsibility.
Daily
The choice is not a single heroic moment but a morning-by-morning discipline.
Forward
Faith is framed as the force that gets people moving when fear wants to freeze them.
Agency
Graduates are treated as people who can shape the emotional weather around them.
The center of the address is a repeated decision.
Fear delays, narrows, and isolates; faith gives graduates a practical engine for creativity, movement, and responsibility.
Veterans: Service becomes a concrete assignment
Rather than leave courage abstract, Hanks asks the class to aid returning U.S. veterans with patience, recovery, empathy, and public attention over the next four years.
Return
Veterans embody the uncertainty and fear that await people after a life-altering journey.
Empathy
The charge asks graduates to help without pretending they fully understand what service members endured.
Duration
Four years becomes a reciprocal measure: give veterans sustained attention equal to the class's Yale years.
Rather than leave courage abstract, Hanks asks the class to aid returning U.S.
veterans with patience, recovery, empathy, and public attention over the next four years.
• Key takeaways •
Fear and faith compete daily
Connects to faith.
Humor can carry moral seriousness
Connects to fear.
Veterans turn empathy into duty
Connects to service.
Service requires sustained attention
Connects to veterans.
Agency grows through action
Connects to agency.
Closing charge
The speech sends graduates into a troubled world with agency: do useful things, reinforce faith in others, and let service answer anxiety.
Act before the world feels stable
Action
Courage is tested through practical help, not only through opinions or private resolve.
Trust
Faith becomes something people cultivate in each other by showing up consistently.
Repair
The final instruction is to answer fear by strengthening the people and institutions near at hand.
The speech sends graduates into a troubled world with agency: do useful things, reinforce faith in others, and let service answer anxiety.
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Transcript
The previously catalogued transcript link is no longer live and is queued for re-sourcing. A video of the address is available above.
Machine transcript available for archive analysis; it is unverified and may contain transcription errors.
Provenance
BROKEN transcript link (checked 2026-06-26): gradspeeches.com is a parked/redirecting domain serving no real content. Provenance: Verified from official archive; cross-referenced with NPR commencement archive; cross-referenced with Open Commencement DB
Category: Film/Drama/TV | NPR archive last updated in 2015; destination availability has not been exhaustively rechecked | Open Commencement DB transcript; not independently verified against the original recording | Transcript URL dead (gradspeeches.com is a parked/redirecting domain serving no real content); video fallback present
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