Shadowing Practice: What makes a truly great logo - Learn English Speaking with Video
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This is Michael Beirut.
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I'm Michael Beirut.
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I'm a graphic designer.
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You might be familiar with his work.
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But interestingly, he thinks that logos are just kind of overrated.
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I am actually often very ambivalent about them.
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Let's back out a sec.
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What is a logo?
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Basically the face of a company.
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Some are beloved, some the swastika is a logo and it's reviled, you know?
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They have to work at tiny sizes and huge.
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There are three specific types.
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The first type is the wordmark.
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The wordmark is the easiest one, and it's the one that we're all the most familiar with.
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I mean, John Hancock's signature is kind of a wordmark, and it can look crisp, clean, and modern, like the new Google logo looks.
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It can look somehow that it has roots in a shared heritage, the way the Coca -Cola logo looks, you know.
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The second is pictorial.
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The pictorial logos often function as a kind of rebus, you know.
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It's a picture and you say what's in the picture and it sort of is identifying the name of the company.
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Sometimes directly like
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Target, sometimes more indirectly like Lacoste.
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The third kind is kind of the holy grail, abstract iconography.
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It's everyone's favorite kind of category because it just seems almost like magic, you know.
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As a designer, people come to me and they'll say, oh I want something like the Nike swoosh.
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They think that the Nike swoosh was the Nike swoosh the day it was drawn, but it was nothing the day it was drawn.
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The company that birthed
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Nike commissioned a design student named Carolyn to draw some ideas.
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And the Nike founders didn't really like them.
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They sort of said, oh, let's use that one.
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It wasn't like an overnight success.
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And then they started putting on the science of shoes.
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The shoes were good.
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And then the genius of Nike's marketing apparatus made us further associate that product not not merely with performance athletic gear,
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but with the very idea of athletic achievement itself.
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And that's how, over a long time, a little mark means something big.
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That's exactly how religious symbols work.
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It's obviously not just anything inherent in these shapes,
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but it's about what those shapes have come to represent in the minds of the people who are looking at them.
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But there's a fourth type of logo that goes beyond these three types and can use elements of each of them.
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The logo system, a graphical framework that can have endless permutations.
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The first gigantically popular example of the logo system would be MTV.
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But Google's Daily Doodles are another great example of the logo system, a familiar mark that can also point to other ideas and issues.
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This approach all has to do with technological change.
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It used to be if a company was doing a logo, there'd be this military operation by which it would be inscribed on all their equipment
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and on their airplanes and their retail facilities and gold pins
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and couplings would be made for the executive suite
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and put on spittoons and ashtrays and the top of the skyscraper and we say dwell on everyone's business card, right?
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Nowadays, none of that's as important as an email signature
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or your Twitter avatar or the little thing that sits next to your URL.
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Those things are much more ubiquitous and they can be changed at the drop of a hat.
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Beirut used this system approach for his Hillary Clinton logo.
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We wanted to have a mark reflect the electorate and reflect the issues.
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Those simple forms that comprise the H with the arrow in it are actually designed to hold not just two colors,
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say red and blue, but any colors you want.
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The use of logo systems seems to be continually on the upswing now,
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probably because it allows the brand using it to expand the conversation beyond its own name.
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The logo kind of reminds people that that's what our priority is today.
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But at the end of the day, regardless of the shape, style, or system, it might not matter what your logo is.
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It really is about thinking of these symbols as being empty vessels in a way, and then you pour the meaning into them.
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So what's this all add up to?
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Basically, those fights people get in about new logos are pretty misguided.
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They think they're judging a diving competition, but actually, all these organizations are in swimming competitions.
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It's not what kind of splash you make
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when you hit the water it's how long you keep your head above that water.
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Logos need to have a long life, not win points in a discussion.
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12 years after the birth of that
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Nike logo, Nike came back to that graphic design student Carolyn with a gift.
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A Nike ring with her own trademark on it, the swoosh.
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Thank you very much, it's beautiful.
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And an undisclosed amount of Nike stock.
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Wow.
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In 1973 when it was designed, her pay was $35.
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Thank you.
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This speaking lesson is built on the video “What makes a truly great logo”. The speaker keeps coming back to these words: logo, nike, type, swoosh, mark. This video has 51 sentences and 830 words to shadow. The speech runs for 4:32. The speaker talks fast, about 183 words per minute, so expect linked and reduced sounds. Only 80% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English, so the vocabulary is demanding.
Key vocabulary in this video
15 words from the video worth learning, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| logo noun | /ˈloʊ.ɡoʊ/ | A visual symbol or emblem that acts as a trademark or a means of identification of a company or organization. |
| designer noun | /dɪˈzaɪnɚ/ | A person who designs something, or who designs things as a profession. |
| reflect verb | /ɹɪˈflɛkt/ | To bend back (light, etc.) from a surface. |
| symbol noun | /ˈsɪmbəl/ | A character or glyph representing an idea, concept or object. |
| vessel noun | /ˈvɛsəl/ | Any craft designed for transportation on or in water, such as a ship, boat, or submarine. |
| signature noun | /ˈsɪɡ.nə.t͡ʃə/ | A person's name, written by that person, used as identification or to signify approval of accompanying material, such as a legal contract. |
| shoe noun | /ˈʃu/ | A protective covering for the foot, with a bottom part composed of thick leather or plastic sole and often a thicker heel, and a softer upper part made of… |
| graphic adjective | /ˈɡɹæfɪk/ | Drawn, pictorial. |
| athletic adjective | /æθˈlɛt.ɪk/ | Having to do with athletes. |
| regardless adverb | /ɹɪˈɡɑɹd.lɪs/ | Without attention to warnings or indications of bad consequences. |
| element noun | /ˈɛləmənt/ | One of the simplest or essential parts or principles of which anything consists, or upon which the constitution or fundamental powers of anything are based. |
| founder noun | /ˈfaʊ̯n.dəː/ | One who founds or establishes (a company, project, organisation, state, etc.). |
| gear noun | /ɡɪɚ/ | Equipment or paraphernalia, especially that used for an athletic endeavor. |
| priority noun | /pɹaɪˈɒɹɪti/ | An item's relative importance. |
| associate noun | /əˈsoʊʃi.ət/ | A person united with another or others in an act, enterprise, or business; a partner or employee. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| add up to verb | To have a particular effect in combination. |
| back out verb | To reverse (a vehicle) from a confined space. |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 9 contractions and reduced forms, such as I'm, didn't, there'd. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: shoe /ˈʃu/, associate /əˈsoʊʃi.ət/, splash /splæʃ/, swoosh /ˈswʊʃ/, ashtray /ˈæʃ.tɹeɪ/
- Long words — get the stress right: priority /pɹaɪˈɒɹɪti/, associate /əˈsoʊʃi.ət/, technological /ˌtɛk.nəˈlɑ.dʒɪ.kəl/, continually /kənˈtɪnjuəli/, apparatus /ˌæp.əˈɹeɪ.təs/
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Start at 0.75× speed, shadow it sentence by sentence, then go back to normal speed once it feels easy.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like logo, designer, reflect.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.