Page 46 - Between One and Many The Art and Science of Public Speaking

Chapter 1 Practical Speaking 13

Dyad Group of 4 Group of 6
(1 line of communication) (6 lines of communication) (15 lines of communication)

Exhibit 1.1
Lines of Communication.
The lines of communication increase with the number of people. This may be one reason
people are fond of the saying “Too many cooks spoil the broth.”

communicating in a system and the number of lines of communication between
or among them. As illustrated in Exhibit 1.1, the lines of communication in-
crease geometrically as the number of communicators increases. Whereas this
change isn’t especially dramatic as you move from two communicators to three
or four, the change is staggering by the time you get to a group of even seven.
Exhibit 1.2 models the interdependent parts of the public speaking trans-
action as a system. Consider (1) the rhetorical situation (context) in which
the public speaking transaction takes place, (2) the speaker and the audience,
(3) the messages they exchange, (4) the process of constructing and interpret-
ing the symbols they use to convey their messages, (5) the channels through
which the messages are sent, and (6) the role perception plays in the process.

The Rhetorical Situation
Scholar and professor Lloyd Bitzer fi rst introduced the concept of the rhetori- rhetorical situation
cal situation. Bitzer described it as “a natural context of persons, events, ob-
A natural context of per-
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jects, relations, and an exigence [goal] which strongly invites utterance.” We
sons, events, objects, re-
deal with Bitzer’s description of the rhetorical situation in detail in Chapter 6, lations, and an exigence
but we introduce it here as a concept that frames the parts to the whole. [goal] which strongly
Consider fi rst the physical situation that speakers face. It’s one thing to speak invites utterance.
inside a classroom and quite another to speak at an outdoor graduation cer-
emony. Whereas we can generally rely on our natural voice to speak inside a
classroom, we probably will need a microphone to be heard outside. Changes
also may be required in our gestures, movements, and decisions about such
things as visual aids.
Next consider what Bitzer calls the “exigence,” which is closely related to the
goal a speaker seeks to fulfi ll. What is it about the situation that moves us to