Chapter 17
Persuasive Speaking
CHAPTER OUTCOMES
• Define the goals of persuasive speaking
• Develop a persuasive topic and thesis
of your audience.
o Attitudes are general evaluations of people, ideas, objects, or events. They are our feelings
about something.
o Beliefs are ways in which people perceive reality.
o Behavior is the manner in which we act or function.
by persuading the audience that a current policy is not working or that a new policy is
needed.
• Understanding Your Audience discusses the importance of understanding your listeners’
disposition and needs as well as what is most relevant to them
o Social judgment theory argues that persuasion depends on the audience’s current attitudes
© 2018 Bedford/St. Martin’s. All rights reserved.
− A receptive audience agrees with your viewpoints and your message and is likely to
respond favorably to your speech. They probably have a large latitude of acceptance.
− A hostile audience opposes your message. They probably have a large latitude of
noncommitment.
− A neutral audience falls between the two, with its members neither supporting nor
opposing you. Their neutrality may stem from disinterest or lack of information.
o The stages of change model also helps you understand your audience’s disposition. Stages
include: precontemplation, contemplation, preparation, action, and maintenance.
o Maslow’s hierarchy of needs holds that our most basic needs must be met before
thought.)
• Strategies for Persuasive Speaking examines the three forms of rhetorical proof (or
classical appeal): ethos, logos, and pathos:
o Ethos is the effect of the speaker’s credibility, character, and goodwill on a presentation.
− Speakers also create ethos through homophily—how much the audience perceives the
premises.
threat as serious, as likely to happen to them, and that there is a specific action they can
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− Using a Red Herring fallacy is relying on irrelevant information for an argument.
− Personal Attack (ad hominem) fallacies attack the person and not the argument.
− Begging the Question presents arguments that no one can verify; this is also called a
circular argument.
− This type of format works well when you are presenting a proposition of policy.
o The Refutational Organizational Pattern presents the main points of the
refutes them with main points that support the position.
1.
Provide some examples of logical fallacies that you’ve experienced when listening to a
speech or discussing a controversial topic with another person. Which type of fallacy did you
recognize? Bandwagon fallacy? A red herring? A personal attack?
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2.
What are some examples of propositions of fact, value, and policy?
3.
How is speaking to persuade similar to informative speaking? How is it different?
4.
What is Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, and how does it apply to understanding the audience?
5.
What are ethos, pathos, and logos? How are they used in persuasive speaking?
1.
Did You Believe?
2.
Did You Really Need That?
3.
What Do Others Think?
4.
Emotional Buy or Logical Buy?
5.
False Advertising?
CLASSROOM ACTIVITIES
1.
Persuasion and Responsibility
1.
DVD of Law & Order: SVU, season eleven, or a streaming account (Netflix, Hulu, Amazon,
NBC, etc.) that will allow you to stream the episode
1.
Show Law and Order: Special Victims Unit, season eleven, episode 11, from point 32:45 to
point 35:11. This episode deals with personal responsibility and HIV contraction.
2.
Ask the students about the advertisements that the district attorney (DA) points out
regarding HIV prevention. Do the students find the advertisements persuasive? Why or
why not?
2. Creating a Syllogism
2. Whiteboard or blackboard
Directions:
2.
Ask students to create their own syllogisms.
3.
Ask students to share their syllogisms with a partner, and then ask for volunteers to share
3. Persuasion Walk
Goal: To have students be able to identify multiple instances of persuasion—both obvious and
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© 2018 Bedford/St. Martin’s. All rights reserved.
Directions:
1.
Lead the class on a walk around the campus (as a group) for fifteen minutes. During the walk,
students should be on the lookout for persuasive messages—both implicit and explicit.
2.
Return to class and discuss as a group the different examples people saw.
4. Persuasive Message Creation
1.
Various materials for students to create persuasive messages
1.
Ask students to create a persuasive message about a fictional product. This can take the form
2.
Pair the students up. Have each student in a pair critique the other’s persuasive message.
5. Political Logical Fallacies
2.
Notepaper and pencils
Directions:
2.
Instruct students to see if they can pull out any logical fallacies.
4.
Students must use the correct terms and support their argument with examples from the
videos.
1.
How is speaking to persuade similar to informative speaking? How is it different?
2.
Define propositions of fact, value, and policy, and give an example of each.
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3.
What is the stages of change model and how does it apply to understanding your audience’s
disposition?
7.
Describe the comparative advantage pattern and give an example of a speaking situation
where you might organize a speech using this pattern.
8.
Outline a persuasive speech (the topic is your choice) using Monroe’s motivated sequence.
MEDIA
Big Love, “Pilot” (2006)
This HBO drama revolves around the life of Bill Henrickson, a Mormon polygamist; his
to reaffirm or reconsider stereotypes about polygamy and the people who practice it.
The Great Debaters (Weinstein Company, 2007)
The Great Debaters dramatizes the real-life victories of a debate team from the historically
fact, policy, and value. Ask students to explore how persuasive speaking can draw people
together by generating parity and respect.
Scandal, “Sweet Baby,” episode (ABC, 2012)
The first episode of this popular nighttime soap introduces viewers to Olivia Pope, a
Washington, D.C., “fixer” who handles public relation (PR) problems at the highest levels of
business and government. Throughout the episode, the charismatic and forceful Olivia uses
persuasive speaking to make problems go away, whether she’s intimidating a would- be
whistleblower into remaining silent or stonewalling a policeman. Watching Olivia
when Olivia seems disrespectful, steamrolling over insecure people, and times when she
seems respectful, seeking compromises that address multiple considerations.
Sicko (Michael Moore, 2007)
logical fallacies he employs. See if students can identify some of the logical fallacies Moore
uses.
What Women Want (Paramount Pictures, 2000)
Mean Girls (Paramount Pictures, 2004)
of this movie?