Page 385 - Between One and Many The Art and Science of Public Speaking

352 Part 4 Contexts for Public Speaking

fact, the series of fi lms developed by famed director Frank Capra to motivate our
troops by telling them Why We Fight, was explicitly labeled as “information.”
As you select your speech topics, you need to be aware that simply calling
something an informative presentation is no guarantee that it will be received
by your audience as free of any persuasive intent. For instance, we have heard
students speak on such “informative” topics as “10 reasons why Rudy Giuliani
should be president.” Of course, the speaker gave information in the speech.
However, clearly the goal was not to just convey the facts but to motivate the
audience to vote a certain way. Thus, before you choose a topic for an informa-
tive speech, be sure to ask yourself whether your ultimate goal is really to just
provide the facts and information or rather to affect people’s attitudes and be-
haviors. Speeches that focus primarily on the latter goals are more appropriately
delivered as persuasive speeches. When in doubt about the appropriateness of a
topic, our advice is always to ask for feedback from your instructor.

Informative Speaking
and Audience Analysis

In Chapter 6 we discussed how to analyze an audience in terms of cultural, de-
mographic, and individual diversity. As we prepare our informative speeches,
it is important to pay special attention to the results of such an analysis. For
example, because the purpose of informative speaking is to increase audience
knowledge, we need to know what our audience already knows about our topic.
If they already know most of what we plan to say, then the speech will bore
them. On the other hand, if they are clueless about the topic and we launch into
a jargon-fi lled technical presentation, they will be lost.
Audience culture is equally important for informative speakers. For example,
in the movie Stand and Deliver, one of the biggest challenges Jaime Escalante
faced was the perception by Latino and Latina students that learning math
would have no impact on their lives. Because he shared their culture, he makes a
point in one scene of talking about how their ancestors, the Mayans, were more
mathematically advanced than the Greeks or Romans, who lacked the concept
of zero. Escalante says to his students, “you . . . have math in your blood.”
Age is another important factor to consider, particularly if it differs greatly
from our own. Many older students have taken our classes, and sometimes they
need reassurance that they can master the material. Similarly, as we continue to
get older while our students for the most part remain 18–22 years old, we fi nd
that we must constantly remind ourselves that experiences we remember vividly
may be only historical footnotes to our students. For example, the space shuttle
Challenger exploded shortly after launch in 1986. Although that event is as vivid
in our minds as if it had occurred yesterday, we have to remember that the stu-
dents who read this book were unlikely to have even been born in 1986. On
the other hand, they are likely to vividly remember the space shuttle Columbia,
which disintegrated on reentry in 2003. One example would be effective with
an older audience, the other with a younger one.
We also need to carefully analyze our audience’s beliefs, attitudes, and val-
ues for informative speeches as well as for persuasive speeches. For example,
imagine a student in 1998 speaking about why President Bill Clinton was being