Favorite Speech a Tribute

I’d say that my last speech (Tribute) was my favorite one. It was something I wanted to share with the class and I have always held that person close to me. It was also nice hearing everyone else’s speech. It was a pretty emotional session for everyone. It really just goes to show you the impact that we have over each other. It’s an inspiring moment. I think what’s even more important is how daring it was for everyone to express their feeling and really open up to a class room of complete strangers. When I was giving that speech, I really meant the things I was saying. I believe that’s what makes the tribute speech so favorable. Although the other speeches I gave were equally just as meaningful, the tribute speech is a pure emotional roller coaster  I can only hope that my other speeches leave just as much impact as the tribute speeches do on everyone else.

Concepts We're Given

I think what concepts become really helpful are the organizational patterns for each individual type of speech. I think that’s probably what really helped me out. The outline examples were extremely useful reference material. The book also had some great examples but it was nice having something entirely rather than partially. Furthermore, how speakers uses evidence was important. Using creditable sources and having reliable statistics was something you almost usually have to use in most speeches. Gatewatching only seems natural, but I suppose that it’s always important to double check an author’s updates or sites activity. Digital media seems to be the current and future outlook for creditable information, but books and scholarly journals are always great because they’re concrete facts and studies. Although I don’t consider myself an extremely good speaker, I believe that knowing these facts and practicing them has given me a slight edge on the conduction of public speech.

Schooling: Pro & Con

After reviewing both “Schooling: Pro” and “Schooling: Con”, it was easier to spot what types of appeals were being used. In both speeches, either speaker approaches the topic with an emotional proof. In fact they both use more logical and cultural belief coming from opposite ends. I believe their ideas were pretty straight forward; however, I wasn’t too convinced with either argument. Coming from a home schooled environment, I know that as a student you have to be motivated to do your work. Even more so, I did also go to public school; however, there are too many issues that I had no control over. In the end, I went back to home school. K through 12 Institutions are pretty scary. It really depends on the type of staff parents are working with. If there’s one thing I learned from these videos, it that they need to emphasis on their facts. Perhaps using more pitch and tone to really stress key points. You have to catch the attention otherwise the audience isn’t really going to catch those brief pauses for facts. Listening, I didn’t feel connected, but I could relate on the topic. Anyone who’s ever been through some type of education can understand.

Using Evidence Effectively

Using evidence effectively is the foundation for your claims. Whenever a speaker presents evidence, there should always be a clear type of appeal they use. One of the most important concepts from reading this week was something we already learned about in previous chapter. There are four types of appeals one can use in a given speech: Logos, eithos, pathos, and mythos. Logo is the logical proof of facts and statistics. Eithos is the speaker’s credibility of expertise. Pathos is the emotional proof which could be a humorous quote or dramatic story. Finally, mythos is the cultural beliefs and values the speaker shares with that community. Practically all of these can be used in the same speech, in fact, they should be. For the audience to trust the speaker, having a well-rounded amount of facts and personal experience is important for that connection. Personally, in a normal conversation, we logically think about all these appeals even without knowing it. 

Reflecting on Persuasion

Reflecting on past arguments, I never try to get someone to accept my point of view. Perhaps providing facts and weighing the evidences, and thinking about the situation from both sides are something I try to do. Being sociology major, it’s important that I don’t hold egocentric views or bias opinions about a certain subject. Probably my last persuasive discussion was about women and the workplace. I simply provided the fact that the majority of people that hold lower-position jobs are women. This got me into trouble because they called me a sexist… after that I didn’t really want to get into the statistical data of race and gender. I could see though why this would make someone upset. I even agreed and said it was sexist, but it’s how bureaucracy has designed the system. How often do you see women holding a top management position on a corporate ladder compared to men? Right now, the number of women that hold Congress has just increased slightly but the margin is still in favor of men. Nevertheless, reasoning only got me into further trouble and I got weird looks from my female co-workers.

Question of Policy

Critical thinking is a lacking practice we do in our daily lives. It’s easy to find problems, but how do you fix them? When learning about how to be persuasive, one of the most important aspects is providing a solution to the issue. Question of policy is one type of course of action that should be taken. This tackles types of policies that reflected controversies either in substantial or meager topics. Depending on the issue, the speaker might request immediate involvement, general support for a political movement, disapproval of an idea, or a change in behavior. The general concepts of policies are formal doctrines or ethics used by institutions in government and organizations. As you can see, there is a wide verity that the “question of policy” covers. Also, it’s important to incorporate the Monroe’s Motivational Sequence in any type of persuasive argument. I think what’s nice is that Monroe’s sequence works will with the organizational pattern of policy. 

Sea of Persuasion

In our society, people are constantly trying to convince you of something. Whether it’s improving your life, buying goods, changing your views, helping out a specific community, something is always trying to get you to see it their way. The mass media is all around us, in our magazines, books, music, movies, art, news, shows, there’s always an agenda underneath. Personally, I don’t feel like I am as suckered into mass media anymore. The younger population is easily convinced because a lack of education and understanding on most subjects. However, with time that can easily change unless they’ve already imbedded the same views into their socialization. What really persuade me are my peers. I find that those who I am close with deeply persuade me. I also find that being on the line of poverty, you are more aware of the choices you make. You become careful to listen to the facts and find holes in stories. Most of all, it honestly depends on how well those messages relate to your morals.

Monroe's Motivation & Solutions Organization

Over the semester we’ve learned culture, demonstrative, informative, and now we’re moving on to persuasive speech soon. As a speaker, the goal is to convince the audience that whatever you’re talking about is either true or right. You’re job is to be the promoter. In order to hold a good argument, one must have sold evidence and facts supporting their claim, along with a solution. Depending on the topic, having the right organization pattern is critical for starters. For example, if you’re discussing Question of Policy, you might want to incorporate the problem-solution pattern of organization. This shows the audience there is a problem and you have a solution. I think for my speech, the problem-solution organization might fit into the whole “People Should Adopt Kids” because of “X” reasons. For one, I am talking about an institutional problem, and two, there is a tremendous positive solution that can be made for the community and children. Also, a good method to keep in mind is the Monroe’s Motivated Sequence. These steps will insure that your speech is organized in a way that encourages the audience to agree with your standpoint. Here are the steps in order: attention— a hook that is relevant to the audience, need— establishing the problem is an issue, satisfaction—describe the solution, visualization—show the pros vs. the cons, actions—explain ways the audience can contribute.

Vocal Variety

Vocal variety is probably one of the most important aspects of speaking. It creates emphasis on words using rate, pitch, and volume of voice to create differences between words. This is most likely the one area I'd love to improve upon because I believe without this, a speaker would have no character. The audience doesn't what to sit through an informative, persuasive, demonstrative, or any other speech with someone who's monotone. As a speaker, it’s important to connect with your audience not just through eye contact but also through vocal performance. If you're talking about why abortion should be a woman’s choice, you have to actually sound like you are for that movement in rights. Simply stating the facts and reasons is one piece of speaking. You most also act out those words using your voice. Dramaturgy is one way to describe it. Life is one big play and we are all actors in it; thus, it is important to bring those aspects with you onstage.

Flicking Sexism

Flickr, the million user website which allows people to share and upload photos, seems to be in a debate about sexist language. After reading the flickr blogs, it seems that users are more commonly using hash tags that represent specific gender and status. I think it’s somewhat of a problem that the users don’t really care what derogatory language they use to anchor their images. What’s even more surprising is that most people don’t take notice to the sexist remarks, even if they are subtle. In fact, some people even embrace the connotation. Although ethically it is important to keep your speech androgynistic, sometimes it’s important to use specific gender notation in persuasive speech. For instance if you were rallying a feminist movement, you might be trying to unite a specific gender or racial group. This might be a time when you direct you style and linguistics to a specific group. I think it’s important that everyone realizes that sexism in symbolic notation can still hurt people. Although in reality, words that are meant to oppress specific people based on a certain criteria, it becomes obvious that outside that culture they mean nothing.