My Favorite Speech

I think that the informative speech was my favorite out of all of the speeches from the whole semester. I did pretty well on it because I had prepared early enough and it was also a topic that I was really interested in. Part of the reason I liked this particular speech was that I did not have to be persuading anyone or using any specific method. It was just about informing the audience about a topic that I found interesting. I think it makes a lot easier to feel enthusiastic about an informative topic if it is something that you actually find intriguing. Another reason I liked this speech was that it was a type of speech that could be useful to me in the future. Someday I may need to do something like this in my line of work, so it was definitely good practice. Hopefully I’ll be prepared for it if I ever have to do one in the future. 

Home Schooling Persuasive Speeches

I first watched the home schooling pro video from chapter 15. I was surprised by the reasoning behind this speech. She said that public school is like a “prison” and is a place of violence that many people choose to keep their kids away from. I think these arguments may be a little exaggerated. The speaker used appeals to logic and emotion. She gave statistics that talked about how many more hours home school students actually spend learning in a single year. She used example of safety needs for her emotional appeal. The speaker connected with the audience because the topic is something that we all are familiar with. We all went to school. But she is asking you to consider a different option than the one many of us had. She had a good use of facts and statistics that could be helpful in my speech. In the home schooling con video, I was a more in agreement with what the speaker was saying. Something that I found helpful in this speech was that he would ask a question to the audience and then immediately give a reasonable answer to it. This was effective. He used appeals to emotion and to logic also. He talked about how we do not have the tools necessary at home to provide an adequate education. For an emotional appeal, he talked about how students need the classroom setting for self-actualization. 

concept from chp 15

What I would like to talk about from the chapter 15 of the reading this week is using reasoning effectively. Deductive reasoning is where the speaker is arguing “from a general principle to a specific instance or case”. There are many different ways that deductive reasoning can be applied. It can be applied to groups, processes, or events. Another type of reasoning would be inductive. This where you show very specific examples in order to show a more general principle. This is a strong form of reasoning because it allows the audience to visualize the argument and it also makes it more personal because of the specific examples. Another form of reasoning is causal, which is kind of self-explanatory. It’s where one event causes another. The last is analogical, which is one I was not familiar with. It’s where you show likenesses between two separate cases. It allows you to make a connection between something that is familiar to something that is not.

Discussion from reading this week

The most recent discussion I have had in which I was trying to persuade someone was just a few days ago at my work. I needed to convince my boss of the fact that I was the right person to get a shift that I wanted but that others wanted also. I used logical reasoning in order to persuade my boss to allow me to take the shift that I wanted. I had to provide facts to him to show him that I was the right person for the job. I told him about how I was the one that was always available on that day and also that I was the one who had the most experienced at the task that was in question. My reasoning worked well because I succeeded in getting exactly what I wanted because I was able to provide my boss with good reasons why I should be the one he chose for the job. 

Concept from Chp 14

The concept from chapter 14 of the reading this week is defining persuasion. I chose to define persuasion because it is something that will be important to me in the upcoming weeks as I begin to prepare for my persuasive speech at the end of the month. Our book defines persuasion as “relying on language, images, and other means of communication to influence people’s beliefs, attitudes, values, or actions.” The book also talks about the fact that we are bombarded with persuasive messages every single day. Friends may convince us to help them with something, charities are trying to get you to donate to them, or the television is always trying to sell you new products. All of these messages are trying to influence you to behave in a certain way or believe something and act upon it in a specific manner. Also, we, as functioning members of society, must sometimes persuade people to make sure that our needs are met. Persuasion is an important thing to understand because I do not want my speech to sound too informative and not get the point across that action needs to be taken on the matter. 

Organizational Patterns

Monroe’s Motivated Sequence is one way to present a persuasive speech. Monroe’s Motivated Sequence takes your audience through a five step course that asks your audience to understand how important your topic is, have a good understanding of your topic, feel content that the solution you have provided is sufficient, visualize how this solution could go into effect, and have a sense of motivation to participate in solving whatever their problem is. This organizational pattern is designed to instill a sense of need in the audience, but then also to provide a solution for that need and show the audience how they can participate. The problem-solution organizational pattern simply presents a problem and then offers a resolution to that problem. This pattern is useful because you are able to give the audience a reasonable solution to an issue so that they will consider your request sensible. I really liked Monroe’s Motivated Sequence because I feel like it is very efficient in making sure that your audience is persuaded. The five different aspects of it makes sure that your audience really understands why they should be persuaded into whatever your topic is. 

Persuasion

We are all immersed in a sea of persuasion everywhere we go. In just normal everyday conversations people try to convince of us things every day, or try to tell us we should do things a certain way. The same thing goes for every single time you turn on your television. Just today I turned on my TV to see a commercial representing an anti-bullying campaign. As far as interpersonal persuasion goes, I think that each of us probably participates in this multiple times per day. Many conversations that we participate in with friends or family involve trying to convince another of something or to show them why a certain way of doing something is the correct way. The commercial was designed to persuade you to be aware of bullying and to prevent becoming a bully or a victim of bullying. I have not personally had to do a persuasive speech in a very long time, perhaps even since early high school, so this type of speech is a bit rusty for me. I can be a more critical consumer of persuasive messages by examining why this person is trying to persuade me to make a choice or behave a certain way. 

Topic from Week 11 Reading

The topic that I would like to discuss today from this week’s reading is regarding a couple of aspects spoken versus written language. I chose this topic to talk about because it is an important thing to remember that extemporaneous language should be used when speaking because having your speech memorized can sound boring and difficult to follow along with. According to our book, spoken language is dynamic because it occurs in the moment and cannot be recaptured. This is why repetition and redundancy are critical in a speech because the audience needs to be reminded of what you are trying to get across. Because readers can reread passages this means they do not need to repeat things so often. This makes the written language static. Spoken language is also considered immediate, whereas written language is considered distant. Spoken language is in the moment and can get instant feedback. Public speaking also incorporates all of the senses, unlike reading. The speaker also is able to refer to the actual setting that the event is taking place at. 

Speech Buddy Videos Chp 10 and 12

In video 10.1, the speaker is focusing on how to make your speech audience-centered, such as by referring to the current event that you are talking about, using pronouns like “we, us, and you”, and use inclusive language so as not to exclude anyone. Audience-centered language is important to allow your audience to connect and bond with you, and also so you do not leave anyone out or offend. It’s something that can be difficult for me to remember because I’m so used to just having conversations with friends so this isn’t such an issue. Video 10.2 was about effectively using language in your speech. You should choose words that are clear and meaningful to your audience, using repetition to aid in understanding, and choosing words that do not offend anyone in your audience. This was helpful because I have gotten stuck before on choosing words that do not sound sexist or unfeeling. Video 12.1 discusses good and bad vocal delivery. The five main things you need to be aware of are volume, pitch, rate, variety, and articulation and pronunciation. The video showed us that volume is the most important thing to focus on when giving a speech. Video 12.2 was all about physical delivery. The five main parts of physical delivery are eye contact, facial expressions, gestures, body movement, and appearance. This was helpful to me because gestures are something that I tend to forget when giving speeches. I usually am so worried about getting my speech out that I forget to move at all. Video 12.3 centered on practicing your speech. They gave helpful tips on how they practice their speeches, such as using an outline. One tip I think would be helpful would be to practice my speech in sections rather than running through it as a whole. Overall, there was a lot of helpful review in these videos, but some newer information as well. Some things that will be helpful in my speech will be to remember to connect with the audience by using pronouns, using repetition as part of using language effectively, and remembering to pay attention to my volume so the audience isn't distracted by the fact that they have to strain to hear me. 

Nonsexist Language & Flickr

After reading the comments regarding sexist language on Flickr, I then compared them to what our book says about sexist language. Surprisingly, their opinions seemed to be almost opposite. On Flickr, most of the people that commented did not seem to mind using sexist language and were not bothered by other people using it either. Some women commented that they did not mind being  called “girl” when males were normally referred to as “men”. One woman even went so far as to say she did not mind being called “chick” or “broad” or “honey”. The book says that we should always try to use nonsexist language. You should try to not use terms as stewardess and instead refer to them as flight attendants, for example. Also, it is important to not always list certain terms in the same order every time. For instance, you may normally say “men and women”. Our book says to switch terms like these up because it usually sounds to the audience like the first term listed is most important. I was quite surprised by how people felt about sexist language on Flickr. I thought that more women would want nonsexist language to be more prevalently used.