Universidade de A Coruña Facultade de Filoloxía

Marta Iglesias González February 12th, 2021

Filoloxía 2º

ENGLISH LANGUAGE 4. FILOLOXÍA 2º

Unit 1: "Speaking in public”

1.1. The importance of education, language and literature

Paulo Freire, who has been one of the most important educators of the 20th century, is the
author of Pedagogy of the Oppressed (a very recommended book for those who want to
become teachers). He was a Brazilian educator, and he worked a lot so that education was
taken to the poor places in Brazil, to the favelas. “Education must function as the practice of
freedom, the means by which men and women deal critically and creatively with reality and
discover how to participate in the transformation of their world”, he wrote. Paulo Freire, who
was also an activist, said this because, if you have an education, you’re able to be more
critical with the situation that you have to face. Being very critical can be a bit depressing
sometimes, that’s why you also need to be creative, you need to be able to cheer up, you
need to be able to think of solutions; and having an education helps in that sense, too.
Carlota Pérez-Reverte said the following in an interview: “Cultural knowledge is a global
education that gives you tools to have a critical opinion, to be independent, not to be
cheated, to make decisions, and to take the reins of your destiny”.

What is the importance of studying a language and literature degree? Well, life is full of
texts. You walk in the street and find a billboard: it’s a text! You come into a café and read an
article in a newspaper: it’s a text! You come home and turn on the radio to listen to a song:
it’s a sound text! Then you turn on the TV: it’s an audio-visual text! You write an essay or a
WhatsApp message, talk to your family, and so you keep using sound and visual texts! (e.g.
body language), etc.
In the Faculty of Philology, you will learn to improve your critical and creative skills to deal
with texts. Hence, studying a degree with us will not only help you to become a teacher, an
editor, a translator, an interpreter, a public-relations assistant, a writer, and so on; this degree
will be very helpful to you in LIFE.

Another important aspect to highlight is we don’t really think enough about listening.
Philology should help you become not only better writers, better readers and better
speakers, but also better listeners. Ernest Hemingway said: “When people talk, listen
completely. Most people never listen”. John Marshall (US president of the supreme court)
stated: “To listen well is as powerful a means of communication and influence as to talk well”.
Robert Frost (US poet) affirmed: “Education is the ability to listen to almost anything without
losing your temper on your self-confidence”.
During an argument, the smartest person is not the one that imposes her/his ideas on the
other(s), but the one that is able to listen and to even change her/his mind. It is always
smarter having two ideas than just having one!

1.2. Rhetoric and Aristotle’s “three artistic proofs”

Now, rhetoric is the art of discourse, an art that aims to improve the facility of speakers and
writers who attempt to inform, persuade, or motivate particular audiences in specific
situations. Rhetoric typically provides a method for understanding, discovering, and
developing arguments for particular situations, such as Aristotle’s “three artistic proofs”
or modes of persuasion: ethos, pathos and logos. These three are given to us in the text
called Rhetoric. So, in summary, what he goes on to say is that “there are, then, these three
means of effecting persuasion, the man who is to be in command of them must, it is clear, be
able to reason logically (logos), to understand human character and goodness in their
various forms (ethos) and to understand the emotions —that is, to name them and describe
them, to know their causes and the way in which they are excited— (pathos)”. This can be
found in the chapter 2 of the book 1 of the previously mentioned Rhetoric.

More in detail, here is what he says: “Of the modes of persuasion furnished by the spoken
word there are three kinds. The first kind depends on the personal character of the speaker
(ethos); the second on putting the audience into a certain frame of mind (pathos); the third
on the proof, or apparent proof, provided by the words of the speech itself (logos)”. Then he
goes on to explain each of them even further:

- Ethos: “Persuasion is achieved by the speaker’s personal character when the

speech is so spoken as to make us think him credible. We believe good men more
fully and more readily than others: this is true generally whatever the question is, and
absolutely true where exact certainty is impossible and opinions are divided. This
kind of persuasion, like the others, should be achieved by what the speaker says, not
by what people think of his character before he begins to speak. It is not true, as
some writers assume in their treatises on rhetoric, that the personal goodness
revealed by the speaker contributes nothing to his power of persuasion; on the
contrary, his character may almost be called the most effective means of persuasion
he possesses”. In short, what Aristotle is affirming here is that personal character,
and the trustworthiness and the credibility of the speaker is extremely important in
every situation, but it’s even more important in situations where you don’t know the
absolute truth, so you have to be able to trust what that speaker is saying.
So, basically…
● It’s the First Proof.
● It’s the basis of rhetoric and depends on the speaker’s character. Ethos
means the “moral character” that provokes credibility. The more trustworthy
the speaker is found by the audience, the more they will accept his/her
message.
● For Aristotle, ethos includes an honest belief in what you say, knowledge and
(at best) expertise.
 ● Basically: touch the audience’s spirit to make them believe in you!
● An example of a speech with a good mark of ethos is a Visionary speech.
Winston Churchill, for instance, was a very good speaker. He was visionary in
many ways. He even won the Nobel Prize in Literature because of his
speeches. He gave a lot of them during the Second World War through the
radio, and people loved listening to him.
- Pathos: “Secondly, persuasion may come through the hearers, when the speech
stirs their emotions. Our judgements when we are pleased and friendly are not the
same as when we are pained and hostile. It is towards producing these effects, as
we maintain, that present-day writers on rhetoric direct the whole of their efforts. This
subject shall be treated in detail when we come to speak of the emotions”. This
second elaboration that he states refers to pathos, or appeals to emotion, and he is
really saying that this is one of the things that many people are really writing about,
how to get emotional appeals. So, a lot of what Aristotle does is he compares some
of the things that he believes to be true compared to some of the ways in which
Sophists at that time were teaching rhetoric or teaching argument.
So, basically…
● It’s the Second Proof.
● It’s a tool of rhetoric and depends on the speaker’s ability to create the right
atmosphere.
● It represents an appeal to the audience’s emotions. Emotional appeal can be
accomplished in a multitude of ways: (1) by metaphors, story telling, intriguing
questions, statistics, facts, etc.; (2) by a general passion in the delivery of the
speech or writing as determined by the audience.
● Basically: reach the public’s body/heart to make them feel/empathize with
you!
● A good example of this is Dolores Ibárruri, La Pasionaria. She was a very
good speaker, too.
- Logos: “Thirdly, persuasion is effected through the speech itself when we have
proved a truth or an apparent truth by means of the persuasive arguments suitable to
the case in question”. Here we are looking at being able to prove a truth or apparent
truth through arguments.
So, basically…
● It’s the Third Proof.
● It’s another tool of rhetoric and depends on the speaker’s ability to create the
right argument.
● The sophists used the term to mean “discourse”, and Aristotle applied the
term to refer to “reasoned discourse” or “the argument” in the field on rhetoric.
● Basically: connect with the listeners’ minds to make them understand and
follow you!
● A representative example of this is a professional presentations, or even the
class lectures.

The word “rhetoric” comes from the Greek rhesis: “speech”. A rhetor in Ancient Greece was,
thus, a “speaker”.
From Ancient Greece to the late 19th century, rhetoric was a central part of Western
education, filling the need to train public speakers and writers to move audiences to action
with arguments.

1.3. Coherence and cohesion

A brief good summary of both these terms could be the following, provided by Roy Clark in
Writing Tools: 50 Essential Strategies for Every Writer: “When the big parts fit, we call that
good feeling coherence; when sentences connect, we call it cohesion”. Just to be more
concrete:

● Coherence: It’s a semantic property, a quality of a piece of text that makes it

meaningful in the minds of the readers. When the text begins to make sense on the
whole, it is said to be coherent. Coherence can be achieved through the use of:
- titles
- subtitles
- paragraphing
- formatting
- logical ordering
- orthography→ spelling, punctuation, capitalization
● Cohesion: It’s the flow of a text. It can be thought of as glue sticking different parts of
furniture so that it takes the shape the writer wants. It’s the grammatical and lexical
linking within a text or sentence that holds a text together and gives it meaning.
Establishing connections between sentences, sections, and even paragraphs using
synonyms, adverbials (exs.: furthermore, in addition, similarly, likewise, etc.),
conjunctions, pronouns, punctuation, etc. is what brings cohesion in a text.

1.4. Professional speeches

For communication expert Juana Erice, a convincing speaker must do the following:

1. Be empathetic: This is, actually, Aristotle’s pathos. Use your memories, emotions
and experiences to connect with the public —they might have had similar
experiences and feelings and will empathize with you easily—. In Erice’s words: “Let
those who listen to you live what you lived and feel what you felt. If you achieve that,
your experience will become their experience and you’ll have achieved something
precious: to communicate”. Interestingly enough, the latin word communicare means
“to make common”.
2. Be confident: Rehearsing several times before giving your speech is crucial for this.
Trust yourself, whenever you feel insecure, think like Barack Obama: “Yes, I can”.
Don’t fear anything: believe in yourself. Smile and transmit positivity.
3. Be clear: Structure your speech well. Identify your aim or aims and build your speech
around it or them. At the very beginning, give your audience a “table of contents” of
 the speech they are about to hear. This will really help your audience follow you.
Also, choose 3 or 4 arguments to support your aim. Use short sentences as well
(Sbjt. + V + Comp.), and avoid technical terms. For the delivery, memorize and/or
bring a set of cards with bullet points of the main issues —but do not read the
speech—. In addition, be aware of how to use your voice. Take into account the
not-so-paralinguistic elements:

- Pitch: It has to do with inflection, the rise and fall of your voice, or volume.
Project your voice neither too loud nor too soft.
- Tone: It has to do with the expression in your voice; what emotions you want
the listener to feel, based on how you deliver your speech (exs.: feelings of
sympathy, anger, ridicule, sarcasm, empathy, happiness, etc.). Speak in a
calm but also lively tone
- Rhythm: It is the pattern of contrasting elements of sound or speech (exs.:
fast, slow, musical, repetitive, monotonous, etc.). Talk neither too slow nor too
fast.
- Silence: Make a good use of pauses to intrigue the audience whenever
necessary. Surprises usually please the audience.

* Be an actress/actor. They make a good use of sound and silence in order to wait until the
audience reacts to them.

4. Be brave and brief: In Erice’s words: “When people are brave, they are forced to
abandon their zone of comfort… Braveness is an admired quality because it means
risk, uncertainty, change… Furthermore, braveness, is the only way to live life
intensely. To move forward. To grow. To go at the front. It is the main cause of the
great discoveries of humanity and advances in all disciplines”. Provoke your
audience to think differently, out of their zone of comfort, beyond their limits. This way
they’ll gain a new and widener perspective of reality. Last but not least, remember
what Baltasar Gracián stated: “good things, when short, are twice as good”.
5. Be aware of body language: Body language represents 55 % of our ability to
communicate. The body position must be both straight and relaxed. Make gestures
(ex.: hands) only to emphasize the main messages you want to transmit. Use slow
movements (unless dynamism is required). Look at the audience straight in the eye
in a quiet manner. Never show nervousness: professionals never fly off the handle.
Once again, smile! Think of the way Abraham Lincoln standed when giving his
speeches. In addition, if you don’t know what to do with your hands, you may grab a
pen. You may also put your hands and forearms at the back. Indeed, this is a good
position: having no shield between you and the audience, you seem fearless.
6. Be charismatic: Above all, through dialogue. How can you establish a dialogue
when you are providing a monologue? By using 3 resources: self-assuredness,
openness, and a clever use of questions. Questions have the exceptional power of
helping you to approach your audience. They work like a bridge between you and
them. Questions turn the listeners into protagonists and provoke answers. Finally, the
can have a deep impact on the audience. A good example of all of this is Malcolm X,
an excellent speaker.
7. Be humble, frank, coherent, and passionate: In Erice’s words: “Passion brings
forth the best of people because it gives hope back to them, opening the door to a
 future full of possibilities”. A passionate speaker has a clear goal in mind and isn’t
satisfied with what she or he has but wants more. Usually, his or her speeches are
full of an extraordinary concept: hope. Hope for a better world, a more united team, a
wider market, etc. Hope makes us feel that it is possible to reach our goals.

In addition...

8. Be polite: Start with “Good morning/Good afternoon/My name is…) and finish with
“Thank you”.
9. Be very careful about the introduction and the conclusion: They will leave a
clear memory on your listeners.
10. Name the aim or aims in the introduction: Ex.: “In this presentation, I will put
forward that videogames are good for child development”.
11. Do research: Use quotations from experts, for instance, to support your arguments.
Put them in the body of your presentation and never at the end.
12. Be creative: Don’t just repeat what you’ve found; analyze your findings critically. You
may as well contradict other people’s opinions by arguing new ideas.