Monday, December 5, 2011

Reflection on the Persuasive speech presentations:

1) Which speech did you find the most persuasive?

All of the speeches were very persuasive and each one had a different issue that it tackled and tried to persuade us to side along with their position from it. I would have to say that I couldn’t chose one and so I narrowed it down to the top four which are the following: “The right of Palestine to statehood”, “Is cosmetic surgery really necessary?”, “The killing of children under the age of 18” and “Whether children should be given technology?”. All of these speeches really convinced me and I felt that they had a strong presentation aspect to them.

2) What about the speech made it persuasive? Inspiring delivery? Relevant topic? Strong rhetoric?

The one I will chose to answer these questions for is “Is cosmetic surgery really necessary?” The main thing that made this speech persuasive is the presentation of it. The delivery was a bit of both very natural and very professional, and I believe that is what made it so successful. The topic was also very interesting as I was immediately drawn into what Jana was saying. I found that she used all three different rhetorical techniques into a nice mesh equally dividing the availability of each one. For instance, for logos, she used the example of the North Korean plastic surgery addict and that just moved us all to her position from the matter. She also mentioned a variety of statistics that were all in favor of her persuasive speech. In addition to this she used the rhetorical method of pathos; she did this by aiming the speech at us and really aiming some of the questions at our emotions. The topic that she chose is also very relevant to our age group as in some countries that is when they begin to think about getting plastic surgery done. Since we are also exposed to a lot of media like tv shows, movies and so on we see the actors in a positive aspect when they have plastic surgery and that is what Jana’s speech trying to do convince us that well not everyone is perfect.

3) What do you think did well in your speech?

I am not really sure. I think that the written part was done with a lot of effort and so therefore when I came to perform it I tried to imagine the way I was writing it and try to make it as natural as possible. I think I also successfully manage to really link to the audience and I had stressed my topic quite clearly to do so. Another point I think I did well was to use certain literary features such as metaphors, repetition and similes. I tried to also give good examples that would really make it easier for the audience to visualize what I am trying to portray. I think my presenting was also not what I imagined it to be. I was very nervous about presenting but as soon as I stood behind the stand and began talking I sort of relaxed after that and carried out the rest of my speech as if I was speaking to a friend. I believe that because I practiced it a lot I knew how to say what words and phrases in what ways and so the overall fluctuation of my voice might have had a direct effect on how the speech presented.

4) What do you think you could have done better?

Well looking back at it now, I think there are some things I could have done better and that might have given my speech a stronger persuasive element. For example improving the flow of the information, there were some points in the speech that if but in another area would have had a better effect on the end product. So in other words I could have organized my points a little bit more and should have played around with the placement of certain points. I could have also added more logos into my speech. Even though I tried doing this before by looking for statistics etc. I think that I should have tweaked my topic just a little bit to gain more information and be able to mention some sort of survey, poll, statistics, percentages, ratios and maybe some important dates. The last thing I could have added more of was the metaphor. These were also something that I did not know where to obtain them from or place them and so I could have also tweaked the subject more or instead of having three I would have six plus a really long one that I can carry out throughout my speech and reference it.

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