CMN 1 Final Study Guide
Aristotle: Logos
Comes from speech itself, good content 1. Relevant 2. Good Structure (organization) 3. Good Style
Delivery
Contact: 1) making eye contact, engaging the audience allows them to do their job providing you with feedback, only necessary to look into the listener's feedback zone which is the primarily the facial area but also extends to the arms and even hands of a sitting person, important to include all areas of audience 2) making certain the listeners can make contact with you, make sure they can see and hear your nonverbal messages, make sure they can see hands and face Clarity: being loud, clear, articulate, clear nonverbally and verbally Nonverbal clarity: speaking at a moderate pace with appropriate use of pauses, being mindful of when you are presenting critical information or complicated ideas and therefore slow the pace, tone and facial expressions match content Verbal clarity: careful choice of words to express ideas, avoid use of slang, technical terms, or acronyms without first giving an explanation, avoid being unintentionally vague or imprecise ex. Everyone, you guys. Control distractions: 3 categories of distraction, 1) noisy 2) repetitive 3) unusual Noise: avoid creating noisy distractions by making certain you do not bring or wear anything that makes noise Repetitive: saying um a lot can be distracting, repetitive vocal inflection can be a distraction, monotone, repetitive gestures such as pushing hair back, hand wringing, fist shaking can be distractions, pacing back and forth too much, don't bring anything to podium you might want to play with Unusual: dress appropriately, be considerate to your audience don't wear something difficult to look at clashing prints or patterns or impossible to avoid looking at (shirts with written messages, too much bare skin), stand upright, you should more or less stand still, however it would be unusual if the speaker didn't move at all Controlling environmental distractions: lock doors so latecomers can't come in, ask audience to silence phones, if you can see where you are speaking before hand try to see how the lighting sound and height of the podium. If a distraction occurs you can either: 1)ignore the distraction and keep speaking 2) pause to allow the distraction to pass without mention 3) acknowledge the distraction and move on Ignoring distraction: good way to handle distractions that are brief, mild, may not be noticed by others, or are impossible to change (Ex. Someone coughing, a clock ticking, flickering light), you don't call your audience attention to it so you reduce the effect of the distraction Pausing to allow the distraction to pass: good way to handle a brief but loud or strong distraction (Ex. Taking a phone call leaves the room, waiting for the plane flying overhead to pass before finishing a point, someone has a coughing fit), prevents listeners from missing what you were saying due to noise or distractions, only practical for a few of these types, don't want a choppy speech Acknowledging the distraction: is appropriate when you believe it would be more distracting to act as if nothing had occurred (Ex. An audience member sneezes but no one says bless you might be more distracting, someone walks in late but no one says hello, the lights go out you should probably acknowledge that) Confidence: you want both real and fake confidence, it is important to establish your credibility before you even speak Real confidence: thinking you are a great speaker can come off cocky and damage your ethos, you should instead think your message is good, believe in the message, to do this know what you want to say, know what you want to say is important and believe that your listeners will benefit from what you're going to say. To gain real confidence, focus on the quality of your message Fake confidence: avoid doing things that will undermine the audience's perception of your confidence level, never say you're a poor speaker, complain about being nervous or apologize for mistakes you might make, take advantage of the confident speaker's greatest tool: silence, before you start speaking walk to the front of the room with a strong posture, and in silence, wait before you begin to speak, before you start make contact with your listeners
Ceicero and the Practice of the Rhetoric: Style
Details of the speech Involves: language to convey message, evaluate presentation aids Four Virtues of Language: 1) Clarity: lack of ambiguity and absence of obscurity 2) Correctness: deviations from customary use of words that could be incorrect grammar or rhetoric 3) vividness: the various aesthetic qualities of language and figures of speech 4) appropriateness: use the words that fit to the subject matter
Methods of Delivery
Formal: Memorized speech: when a speaker commits an entire speech to memory and delivers with notes in front of him or her advanced word-for-word preparation of the verbal elements of a speech, memorized speeches, Cicero considered memory one of the five canons of rhetoric memorizing a speech was a part of quality speech making in Roman Times. Demosthenes was all about delivery, delivery, delivery. Must practice the speech, to remember exact phrasing and so they can pinpoint when to change their volume and tone and when to make gestures to help emphasize points Disadvantages: 1) inability to adjust his or her message to audience feedback, no margin for changing the wording based on a disinterested audience 2) freeze up, you might forget something causing you to pause too long and lose your place (try to speak about the next thing you can recall) Manuscript speech: when speakers have an entire speech written out word for word in front of them as they speak Advantages: you do not have to fear the freeze, sounds organized, possibility of jumping off the manuscript, allows you to note where to make gestures and employ different nonverbal actions at moments during your speech Disadvantages: making adjustments to audience from feedback is hard to do without experience, temptation to stare down at the manuscript and read to the audience making you appear distant and disinterested, speaker is focused on the manuscript making it hard to focus on the audience of their own gestures and reactions, making it hard to successfully incorporate effective and positive nonverbal communication into the presentation, less entergeic, distance the speaker from audience. Impromptu: little preparation, while the most flexible, offers little in the way of speaker control, a presentation done with little or no preparation, unplanned, unprepared, can be as short as a minute or ten depending on topic, speaker, situation, best to quickly develop a mental outline, think of the situation and the audience, Advantages: often short, audiences typically have lower expectations for impromptu speeches than they do for a planned presentation Disadvantages: high stress Extemporaneous: requires advanced preparation and practice of enough of the elements of the speech to have control over the content but also be able to speak in a conversational style, a speech delivered with notes but not the entire speech in front of the speaker, requires practice much like memorized speeches Advantages: allows for speakers to have organized references in front of them in case they lose their place during the presentation, 1) more natural and fluid delivery, adapt to your audience feedback and expound on or eliminate examples and points based upon the audience's reaction, vocal inflections and physical gestures come off more natural since they are not planned, when you stress an inflection of a word or syllable it comes from your emotions giving you a perception of authenticity, 2) improved eye contact with audience with the ability to still check notes if needed, Depends on adequate practice and strong organized set of notes, speaking outline, takes a lot of time to prepare this outline but has a large pay off Disadvantages: creating an effective speaking outline and keeping your notes organized (bullet points can make you lose track, note cards can get out of order)
Aristotle: Ethos
The power that comes from credibility of the speaker 1. Good sense: know facts in perception of audience 2. Good Moral Character: trustworthiness (free hands) 3. Good Will: cares about audience - don't insult want to be there
Ceicero and the Practice of the Rhetoric: Delivery
Use key words, how speaker physically and vocally presents the speech
Immediacy Factor
how the presence of a live speaker makes the listeners feel closer to the message thus increasing the messages impact on the listeners, immediacy is a feeling of closeness, and closeness increases engagement.
Ceicero and the Practice of the Rhetoric: Memory
learn material well enough to be able deliver speech without extensive notes. More eloquent without written material. Commit attention getter, thesis and conclusion. Only full memorization in formal style
Ceicero and the Practice of the Rhetoric: Invention
"come upon" Involves electing and performing research on given topic. Speaker must determine general purpose for speaking- INFORM, PERSUADE, ENTERTAIN- then chose a pic and narrow down specific purpose and central idea that audience will understand or believe
Functions of nonverbal communication (positive and negative)
+1. Nonverbal actions can allow you to reiterate your verbal message without saying it, nonverbal behaviors repeat their verbal counterparts (Ex. Pointing to people in audience when you reference them) +2. nonverbal messages can amplify or accent your desired message (Ex. Pounding on podium to emphasize a point) +3. Nonverbal actions are most effective when they complement the verbal message. This occurs when the nonverbal message is the same as the verbal message. (ex. Speaker laughs at a joke he inserts into his speech= this displays the action associated with the verbal content of the joke) +4 facial expressions and body movement can also substitute for verbal content on occasion. (Ex. A person who smiles after being introduced to speak doesn't necessarily need to state her enjoyment for being there because her smile says that) these nonverbal actions substitute for verbal messages +5 nonverbal messages regulate an interaction. (Ex. Pauses and hand gestures can cue responses and comments from the other person) help audience know when to clap, cheer, or ask questions -1 on the downside, nonverbal cues that contradict can negatively influence your ability to get your message across, these occur when your message says one thing but your body sends the opposite message
Ceicero and the Practice of the Rhetoric: Arrangement
1) arrangement of the overall structure for the speech 2) organization of the "argument" or "body". Effective structure is 1) introduction 2) body 3) conclusion
Public speaking situation (3 criteria of):
1. Communication intention: If out goal is to inform, persuade or entertain 2. Uninterrupted Speaking time: formal or informal, if there is as social expectation that the speaker will have a period of uninterrupted speaking time, advantage to plan in advance and present message without stopping. 3. Multiple listeners: if sender;s message reaches more than one receiver at a time, with multiple listeners you can concentrate all your thoughts and energy on delivering the message once to all relevant receivers.
Sources of public speaking anxiety: Reactions
1.Anticipation: begins a few minutes before the speech, many speakers also experience this reaction any time they think about, or anticipate giving a speech, result of imagining the speech, can be reduced by taking a communication approach to thinking about giving a speech rather than having a performance orientation. 2. Confrontation: occurs when the speaker actually faces the audience and experiences a tremendous surge of adrenaline, heart rates can easily reach over 110 beats per minute, its normal, it's our reaction to having all those eyes of multiple listeners on us, evolutionarily speaking, a group of strangers directly facing you is detected as a threat to your safety, so your body responds with a fight or flight adrenaline rush, only lasts 60-90seconds. 3. Adaptation: reaction begins to occur shortly after the spike of the confrontation and marks a gradual slowing of the heart rate back to normal as well as a reduction in the amount of physiological symptoms the speaker experiences, you can actively pay attention to and monitor the adaptation reaction, you can even speed it up.
4 Stags of Active Listening
1.Sensing: physical aspect of receiving a message, involves ears and eyes of the listener, as long as the sensory organs of the receiver are able to adequately receive the message (involves: hearing, seeing, maybe touch or smell) 2. Attending: requires that we first focus our attention to by that receiver, listeners must control all the other, sometimes random thoughts going on inside their minds and concentrate instead on the incoming message, keying into the correct parts of a message, keying requires that the listener pay attention to the parts of the message that the speaker intends as important, attending involves focus, and keying, verbally symbols, nonverbally signs selective listening: used to describe failing of keying, pick out only those parts he or she wishes to pay attention to. 3. Understanding: involves decoding, and meaning, involves the internal process of decoding and attributing meaning to the message, requires interpreting the signs and symbols, listeners have to decide what the message means Ex. "It's hot in here." Listener needs to determine if that means open a window or if it is just a description. Challenge in the stage of active listening comes from being able to successfully interpret the speakers intended meaning, when we rely on the messages we are actually constructing the meaning of the message from our own fields of experience Schemata: a preconceived mental framework used to organize new information or represent some aspect of the world Fields of Experience: an individual's beliefs, values, experiences, and learned meanings both as an individual or part of a group or society 4. Responding = reacting to the message; some responding is internal and may be masked or covered up in order to save face for either the sender or receiver, Feedback is the only clue a speaker has about how the message is being received unless the listener takes a turn as a speaker and says something, when listeners do switch roles and become senders that response is known as the redirected sender response pseudo listening: pretending to listen by faking a positive feedback response
Aristotle: Pathos
Audience interest values and feelings 1. Connect message to audience intrest 2. Connect to long term values 3. Influence attitude and disposition to message
Aristotle: Artistic Proof
Constructed by the speaker for the occasion. Both topic and occasion crafted for specific moment by speaker to sway audience.
Rhetoric According to Aristotle
Identifies probabilities inherent in an issue or interpretation, rhetoric as a process There are 3 interconnected components of successful persuasion Rhetoric fulfilled 4 functions in an open society 1: upholding truth and justice 2: teaching to an audience 3: analyzing both sides of a question 4: defending ones self
Purpose of Public Speaking: Inform, Persuade, Entertain
Inform: Truly speaking to inform with important info with real intentions to make it interesting. Broad topic selection to specific purpose ( what you want your audience to understand) then Q through research. Persuade: Advocate for something. Make audience want to take action. Entertain: Inspire Feelings and emotions
Ethics
Isocrates and Quintilian said good speakers must have good goals. Quintilian said you should defend the truth. Ways to Lose Credibility or hurt Ethos: Lying by commission: creating new facts out of thin air just to advance your argument Lying by omission: occurs when you choose not to acknowledge facts about your case that might damage it Manipulation: the deliberate misrepresentation of facts and evidence to an audience so that they will see what you want them to see, rather than presenting them with a reasoned argument and trusting their ability to come to a careful decision Coercion: force of threats to make someone do something against his or her will, can manifest itself in both physical and psychological ways Demagoguery: refers to speech that attempts to win over an audience through appealing to their prejudices and emotions, particularly those of fear, anger, and frustration, demagogues violate both of these principles by capitalizing on an audience's emotions to achieve personal, rather than communal goals Building Credibility Ethically Derived credibility: credibility that is produced by everything the speaker says and does throughout the speech Aristotle said three ways to derive ethos: 1) good character 2) sagacity or demonstration of keen discernment and sound judgment 3) goodwill (putting others before yourself) Social scientists added a fourth 4) dynamism: refers to a strong confident delivery that creates the impression with the audience that the speaker has practiced and thus cares about what she is talking about Terminal credibility: the credibility with which you end the speech • 3 standards of ethics for speakers: by individually analyzing and plotting speaker motive (S), message means (M), and outcome on receiver ®, on the continuum line graphs within the ethics box and connecting the dots, the speech act is diagrammed as a triangle, where the triangle falls within the ethics box is a good indicator of how ethical the speech act is o speaker motive: examining yourself as a speaker and your motive, the more altrusistic the motive, the more ethical it is, while the more self interested the motive the less ethical it is ethical/pure altruism, necessity, Self-expression,Self-interest, malice/unethical o outcome on receiver: the potential effect of the message on the receiver or receivers, messages that benefit the listener in some way is ethical, while messages that lead listeners to think or do something that will cause them hard would be unethicals o message means: analyze the means we are using to convey our message and plot that analysis along the following line graph ♣ ethical/pure factual information, edited information, argument, persuasion, emotional appeals, manipulation, deception/unethical
Speaking to Facilitate Listening
People tend to focus on unusual or unexpected, salient or related to one's own concerns, what they learned in the past as being important, or repeated. For keying you can use familiar words or phrases such as the phrase "in conclusion". These phrases are signposts. Another trick is using repetition. For decoding you should choose code that is familiar to your listeners and avoid ambiguity. Another strategy is to use trigger words-words that generate emotional reactions. Example is swearing or using the word "always". For feedback we must use our eyes to make eye contact with the listeners
Sources of public speaking anxiety: Irrational Fears
Spotlight: feeling that everyone in the audience is staring at the speaker intently and scrutinizing the speaker's every move, the fact of the matter is like all normal people, listeners are more focused on themselves than anyone or anything else, we only have a portion of any of our listener's attention at any given time. Illusion of Transparency: common to feel like listeners can "see right through" you and know how you are feeling inside, this is not true, speakers tend to stand a little further away from the listeners than in a normal conversation, so small external indicators of internal states (Dilated pupils, sweaty hands, even blushing) tend to not be visible to the listeners. Expectation of Perfection
Strategies that Increase Public Speaking Confidence
Switching from a performance orientation to a communication orientation is one of the most effective strategies for reducing our public speaking anxiety. Translate or encode our specific intention into code made up of words (Symbols) and nonverbal behaviors (signs), the chosen words and nonverbal behaviors that comprise the message will be sent through a channel (face-to-face, telephone, e-mail, texting, etc.), we must now pay attention to the reactions or feedback of the receiver in order to determine how successfully the receiver understands our original intention. Know specific communication objectives. 1. View public speaking as an opportunity: to share information, influence others, express something important to you, reach more than one person at a time, the presence of a live speaker brings about a sense of connection and closeness to that person 2. Visualization: focus on what will go right and where you will deliver the speech 3. Relabeling: assign positive words to the feelings and physical reactions associated with the anxiety of giving a speech 4. Deep breathing: diaphragmatic breathing or belly breathing, taking deep breaths from the diaphragm, knowing how you can control your own breathing helps you feel more confident in any situation
Transactional model of communication
We send and receive messages and there is a constant exchange between the speaker and the audience. Sender (encode)---- message (Feedback)--- receiver (decode), environment, noise 1. Sender: encodes then transmits (sensory) message with symbols ( words and signs (smiles) 2: Receiver: active listening (sensing and selective attention), attend ( focus) on message and decode message and respond with feedback (signs the receiver sends while sender sends message (eye contact)
