General Studies and Communication Skills

TOPIC 1 Living in Society: Global communication and interdependence

Key unit competence: To be able to analyse and appreciate the power of communication with special emphasis on speech and its impact on international relations and cooperation.

Activity

1. Explain steps one would take to write a speech.

2. Identify the characteristics of a good speaker.

3. Discuss how you would use PowerPoint to make a presentation.

5.1 Speech writing and delivery

A

ctivity 1

1. Is there a talk that you have listened to and really liked?

2. Was there a talk that you listened to and disliked?

3. Identify things that made you like or dislike the talk.

4. In your own opinion, what should the speaker have done to improve the talk and make it memorable?

A speech refers to an address or the spoken expression of ideas, opinions or facts delivered by someone who is speaking to an audience. Speeches are important in our official and social life. One may have listened to many speeches made in different situations. There are those that are still fresh in our minds yet others have faded away. This is because some speeches moved one to take an important action, drove one to make an important decision or touched one emotionally. The speeches that are forgotten had little effect on one and that is why they have faded away from memory. Such is the power of speech.

Some speeches are spontaneously delivered without prior preparation while others are written before delivery. A written speech could be based on sketched out notes to which the speaker adds more information during presentation. In other cases, it could be written in detail, so that little or nothing at all is added during the speech delivery. Speech writing is a process. One has to ensure the content is both meaningful and interesting to listen to. The speech needs to capture the attention of the audience and express the speaker’s thoughts in a logical way. Therefore, one's speech should be well organised, easy to understand and fit for the intended audience. It is important to analyse your audience according to their age, gender, cultural background and profession, as well as the occasion and purpose of the speech.

Activity 2

If you were to give a speech during your school assembly, identify steps you would take to write and deliver your speech.

How to write and deliver a good speech

A good speech should not exceed 20 minutes (Neale and Ely, 2007: page 10). When faced with the task of writing a speech, one may experience difficulties coming up with ideas. However, it is possible to make progress if one follows some simple steps. A good way to write and deliver a speech is to divide the process into the following stages.

Activity 3

1. Discuss why it is necessary to know the occasion and one's audience for your speech during planning.

2. Imagine you are having a farewell party for one of your colleagues at work. Write a speech outline for the occasion and ensure you have points for the speech opening, body and closing.

3. Explain why one needs to know the venue and public speaking tools before delivering a speech.

4. Write a speech one would deliver during your school’s annual general meeting day on behalf of the students. Use the steps required to prepare and deliver your speech.

5. Let some groups deliver the speech from memory and others to read the speech from a notebook. Th e class should comment on the strong and weak points of each presentation from all groups.

6. Research and find out other guidelines for effective speech writing, delivery and principles of speech writing.

5.2 Elements required for a public speech

5.2.1 Audience awareness

While delivering the speech, one needs to adjust the style depending on the audience. One has to select appropriate words, use an appropriate tone and speak in a socially acceptable manner. One also needs to consider the cultural diversity of the audience and take note of cultural differences in interpretation of gestures. Once you have done some research about the topic and content, think of how to make it appealing for the specific audience you will address.

Source: http://webuser.bus.umich.edu/Organizations/umbstoastmasters/file/members/prepare/PlanningSpeech.pdf

Activity 1

Answer the following questions.

1. When writing a speech, what kind of background information will you need?

2. Explain what you would do if your audience is sceptical about the topic of your speech.3. Identify the tone that should be used with a younger and mature audience respectively . Give reasons for your answers.

5.2.2 Adequate preparation

The quality of your presentation is directly related to the quality of your preparation. Therefore, to achieve a good speech delivery, adequate preparation is required. Develop an eagerness to share knowledge with the audience.

Source: http://webuser.bus.umich.edu/Organizations/umbstoastmasters/fi le/members/prepare/PlanningSpeech.pdf

5.2.3 Establishing credibility

Credibility means being trustworthy or believable. It is important for a public speaker to establish credibility by earning the trust and respect of the audience. Credibility usually comes from the audience perception of the speaker’s competence and character. To achieve credibility, one needs to present oneself as an authority on the topic by being knowledgeable on what one is speaking about. Your credibility as a speaker will depend on your trustworthiness and competence. Th e following are three types of credibility:

Initial credibility is that which an individual has before delivering the speech, mostly based on the reputation and credentials of the speaker. Derived credibility is acquired while delivering a speech if the quality of the speech and the professionalism of the speaker are commendable. Terminal credibility is the credibility a speaker gains or loses after delivering a speech. It relates to the lasting impression that the speech leaves with the audience.

Source: Griffin, Cindy, L. page 293

5.2.4 Technology test

One should arrive early to test the public speaking tools and resolve any hitches. If one plans to use audio-visual aids such as PowerPoint slides, test all equipment. Ensure there is a backup plan for delivering the presentation if technology fails. Never assume that technology will always work. Practise how to make any adjustments before the presentation.

Source: Metcalfe, Sheldon. ( 2013) page 208

Activity 2

1. Explain how one would ensure technology does not fail when delivering a speech.

2. Characterise the positive preparation required to achieve an effective speech.

3. Identify ways in which an individual can attain credibility as a speaker.

5.2.5 Valid or relevant content

For one to achieve a successful speech, one needs to have solid content. Th e content should be appropriate for the type of audience one is addressing. Th e speaker should use the content and develop it into a fine story. However, do not give the audience too much information that is not relevant to them. Familiarity with one's content and adequate preparation before speech delivery eliminates nervousness. One needs to write a logically fl owing speech, rehearse the speech several times and answer anticipated questions. This will help build the confidence needed for successful delivery of a speech.

Source: McGraw-Hill . (1995) page 32

Activity 3

Analyse the following speeches according to the content, audience, occasion and outcome.

‘An ideal I am prepared to die for’. By Nelson Mandela

This speech was delivered in 1964 in a Pretoria courtroom, having been in jail two years by then.

I have always regarded myself, in the first place, as an African patriot. After all, I was born in Umtata, forty-six years ago. My guardian was my cousin, who was the acting paramount chief of Thembuland, and I am related both to Sabata Dalindyebo, the present paramount chief, and to Kaiser Matanzima, the Chief Minister for the Transkei. Today I am attracted by the idea of a classless society, an attraction which springs in part from Marxist reading and, in part, from my admiration of the structure and organisation of early African societies in this country. The land, then the main means of production, belonged to the tribe. There was no rich or poor and there was no exploitation.

It is true, as I have already stated that I have been influenced by Marxist thought. But this is also true of many of the leaders of the new independent states. Such widely different persons as Gandhi, Nehru, Nkrumah, and Nasser all acknowledge this fact. We all accept the need for some form of socialism to enable our people to catch up with the advanced countries of the world and to overcome their legacy of extreme poverty. But this does not mean we are Marxists... I have been influenced in my thinking by both West and East. All this has led me to feel that in my search for a political formula, I should be absolutely impartial and objective. I should tie myself to no particular system of society other than that of socialism. I must leave myself free to borrow the best from West and from the East.

...The complaint of Africans, however, is not only that they are poor and whites are rich, but that the laws which are made by the whites are designed to preserve this situation ... There is compulsory education for all white children at virtually no cost to their parents, be they rich or poor. Similar facilities are not provided for the African children... The quality of education is also different... The Government often answers its critics by saying that Africans in South Africa are economically better off than the inhabitants of the other countries in Africa. I do not know whether this statement is true and doubt whether any comparison can be made without having regard to the cost-of-living index in such countries. But even if it is true, as far as African people are concerned, it is irrelevant. Our complaint is not that we are poor by comparison with people in other countries, but that we are poor by comparison with white people in our own country, and that we are prevented by legislation from altering this imbalance.

... Above all, My Lord, we want equal political rights, because without them our disabilities will be permanent. I know this sounds revolutionary to the whites in this country, because the majority of voters will be Africans. This makes the white man fear democracy. But this fear cannot be allowed to stand in the way of the only solution which will guarantee racial harmony and freedom for all. It is not true that the enfranchisement of all will result in racial domination. Political division, based on colour, is entirely artificial and, when it disappears, so will the domination of one colour group by another. The ANC has spent half a century fighting against racialism. When it triumphs as it certainly must, it will not change that policy.

This then is what the ANC is fighting. Our struggle is a truly national one. It is a struggle of the African people, inspired by our own suffering and our own experience. It is a struggle for the right to live. During my lifetime I have dedicated my life to this struggle of the African people. I have fought against white domination, and I have fought against black domination. I have cherished the ideal of a democratic and free society in which all persons will live together in harmony and with equal opportunities. It is an ideal for which I hope to live for and to see realised. But, My Lord, if it needs be, it is an ideal for which I am prepared to die.

’I have a dream’ by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation. Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.

But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languishing in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land. So we have come here today to dramatize a shameful condition.

In a sense we have come to our nation’s capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked “insufficient funds.” But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. So we have come to cash this check — a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice. We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quick sands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God’s children.

It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro’s legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a beginning. Those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual.

There will be neither rest nor tranquillity in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges. But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred.

We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force. The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny. They have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone.

As we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead. We cannot turn back. There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, “When will you be satisfied?” We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied, as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro’s basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their selfhood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating “For Whites Only”. We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.

I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. Some of you have come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive.

Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to South Carolina, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed. Let us not wallow in the valley of despair. I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.” I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood. I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream today. I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; one day right there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers. I have a dream today. I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.

This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the South with. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day. This will be the day when all of God’s children will be able to sing with a new meaning, “My country, ‘tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of the pilgrim’s pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring.”

And if America is to be a great nation this must become true. So let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania! Let freedom ring from the snowcapped Rockies of Colorado! Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California! But not only that; let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia! Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee! Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi. From every mountainside, let freedom ring.

And when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, “Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!”

5.3 Characteristics of a good speaker

                                      

5.5 Using technology (PowerPoint) to make effective presentations

Activity 1

1. Have you ever used Microsoft PowerPoint? If so, share your experience with your classmates.

2. Why is PowerPoint the most important format to use for making a good presentation?3. Identify visual representations that you may use to present data on PowerPoint.

PowerPoint is a Microsoft Office program that is specifically designed to make slideshows for presentations. Th e presentations are created on pages called slides. PowerPoint presentations are supposed to give summarised points and make presentations easier and more interesting to follow. To capture the interest of the audience, one needs to prepare engaging and effective slides.

PowerPoint is easy to use because the slide templates on which content is created are available in the program itself. You only need to add appropriate content in the templates. The following steps may assist you to create effective PowerPoint presentations.