Ali g graduation speech

And despite frequent references to Harvard, Ali ended his speech on a discordant note. “Big up yaself, Princeton!” he shouted in his speech’s extended conclusion. Though Ali G’s brazen commentary formed the afternoon’s centerpiece, he was preceded and followed by an array of student, faculty and alum speakers.

Waving his hands in mock-gangsta motions, the comedian enthusiastically lauded the wide variety of academic specialties at Harvard—from students who are “good at counting,” to historians who can tell “what did Lincoln give America, except for the towncar,” to English concentrators who have “memorized the entire alphabet from A to X.”

Before his mock detainment, Ali—who, despite his sometimes dim-witted persona, is the Cambridge University-educated Sacha Baron Cohen off stage—was eager to display his own depth of knowledge. “Fings like ‘apple’ and ‘orange’ don’t start with a capital letter unless they start a sentence,” he informed the audience of hundreds.

Ali G, Harvard (Class Day), 2004 Ali G was not the commencement speaker in 2004—that honor belonged to Kofi Annan. But Sacha Baron Cohen did address the soon-to-be graduates in full Ali G regalia at the annual Class Day celebration.