Public Speaking

And how to work with it in a rhetorical perspective

Ida Borch

Plan

• An introduction to rhetoric• 30 old school slides with a distilled version of

2000 years of accumulated knowledge on how to get your audience to agree with you

• Most of all: An appetizer• Second of all: An awareness that

improvisation is grand - especially when based on solid craftsmanship

Who am I?

• Ida Borch• Cand.mag in rhetoric, psycho linguistics and

teaching, KU• Associate professor at CBS in personal

branding and intercultural communication• Owner of Orator – Retorik & Rådgivning– Rhetoric– Social media– Qualitative market analysis

Toolbox

• Context awareness – The Rhetorical Pentagram

• Composing awareness – Rhetorical Canon

• Style awareness – The three artistic proofs: Ethos, Logos, Pathos

• Argumentation awareness – Toulmin’s model for practical argumentation

• Coaching awareness – Constructive criticism

Context awareness

The Rhetorical Pentagram

Audience

SpeakerTopic

Constraints Language

Composing awareness

• The Rhetorical Canon

The rhetorical canon

There are five phases you will eventually go through when you compose text – both for oral and literal contexts. You might not follow them in a lineary way – but you cannot avoid crossing each of them:

InventioDispositioElocutioMemoriaActio

The anatomy of a speech

1 2 3 45

Intro

Disposition ArgumentationStating the facts

Finale

Style Awareness

The three artistic proofs

You can approach your audience in various ways. The ancient Greek and Romans believed that there were three ways of appealing to an audience. Persuasion lies in your ability to use an adequate artistic proof – or stylistic level:

EthosLogosPathos

Logos

• Appeal to the intellect• Logical argumentation• Used in law and science • The most prevalent and preferred style in

academic contexts• Advantage: derived of emotion• Disadvantage: Heavy and potentially boring

Pathos • Appeal to the emotions• Emotional argumentation• Used in literature and poetry and contexts that calls for

emotions (i.e. sorrow and happiness)• Vivid language with metaphors and tropes• Advantage: Powerful persuasive potential• Disadvantage: Bears an immanent risk of rejecting audience –

if they do not want to share the emotions projected, the persuasive potential is very limited

Ethos

• Appeal through the speaker and the speakers integrity

• Ethos is not something the speaker has, but something that is in the mind of the audience

• Used in every context – but very visible in politics and literature. And popular science

• Advantage: If you (manage to) establish a credible ethos that alone provides you with a very persuasive potential

• Challenge: If you do not believe the man, you do not trust his words

Argumentation awareness

• Practical argumentation

Logical cc rhetorical proof

• Logical proof: Syllogism–Valid conclusion f

rom the truth of its premises–Based on reason–Must be true

• Rhetorical ’proof’: Enthymeme– Tentative conclusions based on probable pr

emises–Based on common sense–Can be true

Valid logical argument- a valid syllogism

All men are mortalSocrates is a man Socrates is mortal

Toulmin model of argumentation

ClaimData

Warrant Qualifier

ReservationBacking

Socrates is mortalSocrates is a human being

All men are mortal

Socrates is wildly mortal!Socrates is a human being

All men are mortal

qual

ifier

Socrates is wildly mortal!Socrates is a human being

All men are mortal

Even though Plato immortalized him

through his dialogues

Reservation

Socrates is wildly mortal!Socrates is a human being

All men are mortal

At the end of the day, it’s a

biological fact

Even though Plato immortalized him

through his dialogues

Backing

Socrates is wildly mortal!Socrates is a human being

All men are mortal

At the end of the day, it’s a

biological fact

Even though Plato immortalized him

through his dialogues

Toulmins argumentmodel

• Claim• Data• Warrant• Qualifier• Reservation• Backing

ClaimData

Warrant Qualifier

ReservationBacking

Prospect AIESEC members in the model

You should join AIESEC

It is good for your career

One should always make career moves

Perhaps

Unless you’re way behind schedule with

your studies

It’s highly recommended by

the SDU board

Prospect AIESEC members in the model

You should join AIESEC

We’re getting drunk every weekend

Having fun is a human right

Totally

Unless you’re way behind schedule with

your studies

And social networking

benefits relations

Important rule in argumentation

• It’s not always a logical argument that’s the most logical thing to use in practical argumentation

Remember

• What you claim is not the most important thing in argumentation

• How you substantiate the claim and which data you use to support the claim is however extremely important

• If the target group do not share the basic assumption in the warrant, they are hardly liable to follow your claim

Books….in Danish and English• Jørgensen og Onsbergs:

– Praktisk argumentation• Gabrielsen og Christiansen:

– Talens Magt– Academica 2009

• Atkinson:– Our Masters Voices– Routledge 1984

• Steensbech Lemée & Lund– Troværdighed – tal godt for dig– Fydenlund