Ethics and Public
Speaking
Chapter Objectives
After reading this chapter, students should be able to:
1. Explain why a strong sense of ethical responsibility is vital for public speakers.
2. Discuss the five guidelines for ethical speechmaking presented in the chapter.
3. Define the differences among global plagiarism, patchwork plagiarism, and
incremental plagiarism, and explain why each type of plagiarism is unethical.
4. Identify the three basic guidelines for ethical listening discussed in the chapter.
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b. When listening to an informative speech by one of your classmates, you realize that much
of it is plagiarized from a Web site you visited a couple weeks earlier. What do you do?
Do you say something when your instructor asks for comments about the speech? Do you
mention your concern to the instructor after class? Do you talk with the speaker? Do you
remain silent?
Discussion: This case raises interesting questions about plagiarism and the ethical obli-
gations of listeners. If faced with this situation in real life, most students would doubtless
c. While researching your persuasive speech, you find a quotation from an article by a highly
respected expert that will nail down one of your most important points. But as you read the
rest of the article, you realize that the author does not in fact support the policy you are ad-
vocating. Do you still include the quotation in your speech? Why or why not?
Discussion: This scenario gets at a fairly subtle point about ethics and public speaking. Yet it
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2. Lead a class discussion in which students develop a code of ethical listening for their speech
classroom. The final product of the discussion will be a list titled “Ethical Listening for Our
Speech Class.” By the end of the discussion, the entire class should not only agree on the con-
tent of the list, but should pledge themselves to follow it throughout the term.
Discussion: A companion to Additional Exercise/Activity 1 above, this is an excellent way
3. Give each student the following assignment: Identify a situation in your life in which an issue
related to speech ethics was involved. The issue could have affected you either as a speaker
or as a listener. Work up a brief analysis in which you explain the situation and the ethical is-
sue (or issues) involved.
Discussion: This exercise can work very well to promote class discussion about ethical
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Avoiding Plagiarism Worksheet
Name Section
1. What is the meaning of “plagiarism”?
2. According to your textbook, what is global plagiarism? Give an example.
3. According to your textbook, what is patchwork plagiarism? Give an example.
4. According to your textbook, what is incremental plagiarism? Give an example.
5. What does it mean to paraphrase? How is paraphrasing similar to and different from quoting
verbatim?
6. List three guidelines from your textbook that can help you avoid plagiarism.