Our conversation on Friday will focus on audience. In addition to your reading in Resonate, you will need to view the following talks (each just 5 - 10 minutes long) and write a response that addresses how the speaker resonating with audience. What moves are they making to address segments of their audience and how is it working?
Please post your responses as soon as possible before class.
Julia Sweeney has "The Talk"
Shabana Basij-Rasikh: "Dare to Educate Afghan Girls"
In both Sweeney’s and Rasikh’s talks, they use specific strategies to resonate with the audience. Each speaker addresses a very specific audience but one that many adults share, making it relatable for many. While the styles of presenting were very different, each speech addressed difficult issues that are prominent, but sometimes overlooked, in our society today.
ReplyDeleteSweeney’s talk is about the delicate issue of creatively answering difficult and mature questions. Her talk reiterates a conversation and reenacts the dialogue, almost to the word, between her and her daughter. This makes her presentation easy to understand, imagine, and picture, adding to the overall humor of it. Any parent of young children would be able to resonate with this as they learn how to parent their kids and respond to difficult questions. Her audience is people who interact with young children often, which, as the camera pans the audience, is what it appears to be. The stereotypical innocence of a child is something that is addressed in this speech, further implying that innocence is disappearing at a younger age.
I also enjoyed Rasikh’s presentation. I don’t think she had quite as strong of a voice or stage presence about her as some of the other speakers we have watched did, but Rasikh does appear comfortable on stage, and is obviously very passionate about the subject she is speaking of. She has authority because of where she comes from, and her first hand experience with the issue she talks about (logos and ethos). Rasikh uses pauses, facial expressions, and voice deflection to highlight and emphasize that she believes an education is one of the most important things, next to love, that a child can receive. Speaking in America, I think she is also trying to make us aware of the lack of gender equality that still occurs today in other countries. Her speech is empowering, and it makes me want to do something to help those children.
Overall, I really enjoyed both of these talks. As a future educator, I will be a part of both of these issues and challenges. Rasikh’s talk was important to me as I believe that all children have the potential to learn and that the value of an educated child is incredibly important, while Sweeney’s talk is a more delicate conversation that I hope I will never have to address. Both talks effectively glance at two often overlooked issues in our society, and each speaker effectively resonate with their audience to make these two presentations memorable and meaningful.
I found myself drawn into both of the TED talks, which included “Dare to Educate Afghan Girls” by Shabana Basij-Rasikh and “The Talk” by Julia Sweeney. The subject and tone of both varied drastically, but the strategies that each used to captivate the audience became clear. Additionally, each speaker had a clear, defined audience that they hoped to target to make their presentation as effective as possible.
ReplyDeleteIn “Dare to Educate Afghan Girls,” Shabana Basij-Rasikh captured my attention right from the beginning, as she spoke with a combination of thoughtfulness and emotion. She did not exude as much confidence as other speakers that I have seen, including Sweeney, but her honesty and passion allowed the presentation to work effectively. The two primary appeals that she used were pathos and ethos. This speech was filled with emotion—I could feel her passion for ensuring that girls around the world receive a high-quality education. Also, I felt convicted for taking my education for granted. For me, it was expected that I would go to high school, graduate, then attend college. But for thousands of girls around the world, they would risk anything just to obtain a basic education. This idea hit me hard. She also had a strong sense of authority, since she actually experienced having to sneak off to school everyday, risking her life for an education. I believe that her audience consisted of people like me: those fortunate enough to have been given an education and that haven’t needed to fight for it. She wants to show these people that not everyone has it quite so easy, and that we can make a difference by promoting equality for women in the realm of education.
On a much different note, Julia Sweeney addresses the awkward conversation that all parents will inevitably face when their child begins to ask inquisitively about sex in “The Talk.” Sweeney’s talk was engaging, primarily through the use of humor. I think this was very skillful by Sweeney, because she made light of an uncomfortable yet all-too-familiar situation for many parents. I believe that the audience of this piece is all parents who have had to deal with the constantly questioning minds of little kids who want to know everything about big issues, including sex and many others. The way she depicted the exchanges between her and her daughter made the two of them seem like a fascinating pair that I wanted to know more about.
I definitely think that both of these presentations were fascinating and interesting to analyze for the speakers’ use of rhetorical strategies. By watching these two back-to-back, I could see how both a serious and emotional approach and a humorous approach can be equally effective. Also, I could see how it is necessary to determine which approach would be most effective for the audience. Basij-Rasikh’s audience definitely required a more solemn tone in order to convey the tremendous problem of women’s inequality in education. In Sweeney’s speech, the humor made the whole situation more relatable, and would have been uncomfortable if it weren’t for her humor. Both messages were conveyed to each speaker’s intended audience very effectively.
In Julia Sweeney’s talk she uses humor and emotional appeal to both entertain and resonate with her audience. Sweeney first introduces the situation that she is in with her daughter. She then describes the complication of explaining reproduction to an eight year old. Her resolution is short and humorous. Sweeney is coming from a common place of understanding with her audience that is comprised of adults that have most likely either been in this situation or known those who have. Many are probably parents themselves. When Sweeney speaks about how she came to explain reproduction to her daughter in the way that she did, she does not lecture her audience or claim that her way is the best way to handle the situation. Sweeney explains that she used the advice that she had found in parenting books that told her not to give more information than needed. This small part of her speech was something that most parents would relate to. The feeling of uncertainty and the reliance on things like parenting books or classes is a shared experience among those with children. Sweeney ends with humor and lying to her daughter, another action that most adults have felt necessary when explaining a complicated subject to a small child.
ReplyDeleteIn dare to educate Afghan girls, Shabana Basij-Rasikh also uses emotional appeal by telling a personal story about her life. Rasikh explains the education system for women in Afghanistan. She plays to her audience well, which are mostly women. Rasikh uses facts and statistics to help show the amount of change in Afghanistan for women attending school. She also adds the emotional stories of others who were struggling to attend school in her area. The dangerous aspects of the stories help to get the attention of the audience and engage with them throughout the story. Rasikh speaks and also uses the board behind her to put up quotations from her stories so that her audience both sees and hears the words. She mentors her audience about the importance of education for women and the role that supportive fathers play in the situation. This is done after she has explained the story of her own father. Showing how his support has changed her life helps the audience to understand what she means by having male support for female education. It aids in persuading the audience to agree with her. The contrast between someone like a member of the Taliban and her own supportive father help to show the best and worst sides of men in her area or “the what is” and “what could be” of men in Afghanistan. It provides an emotional contrast to her story.
These TED Talks, although obviously possessing polar opposite appeals, do an amazing job of engaging the audience in both circumstances.
ReplyDeleteTo begin, Julia Sweeny captures the audience’s full attention with her humor. She uses the common ground of adulthood, sexual activity, and parenting as a means to anchor her presentation. Throughout Sweeny’s talk, it is evident that she gains the audience’s appeal through their outright bursts of laughter. She does a wonderful job of including facial expressions and even gestures to display her sarcastic and humorous tone. One of the most apparent ways that Sweeny resonates with the audience is through her articulation of her daughter’s innocent curiosity about reproduction, combated with the mother’s own hesitant explanations. I thought she portrayed the awkwardness of the situation best with her short explanations of “Yes…” or “No, that would never happen…”. The intentionally excluded details here allowed the audience to fill in their own images and feelings for what the full answer would have been to the daughter’s very blunt questions about sex. Overall, Sweeny’s presentation was very bold, but with the inclusion of a childish explanation of an adult topic, she made a potentially awkward talk become hilarious, yet somehow still managed to keep it classy.
In complete contrast to Sweeny’s talk, Shabana Basij-Rasikh gives a heart-wrenching story about education that completely captivates the audience. Throughout the entire presentation Shabana speaks in a slow and steady tone of voice, with not much body movement, to portray an enduring tone that perhaps represents the experiences that her and her family went through. Shabana segments her presentation into two parts: first she tells the story of her education and the sacrifices and support of her family to avoid the Taliban and educate their daughters, and then she talks about her present company that strives to continue educating Afghan women today. These segments work together in drawing the audience in, and then moving them to action and support of her cause. It is absolutely amazing that a woman coming from her culture and with those kinds of risks could persevere through such dangerous obstacles to receive an education. As privileged Americans, we don’t even consider how fortunate we are to have the opportunity to study freely everyday at whatever school we choose. Shabana very humbly articulates her life struggles through her story, and consequently drives the audience, through pathos, to support her movement in the end.
In both presentations I found myself completely engaged and/or moved. Although in different ways, I noticed that the presenters were very successful in connecting with me, so I can imagine the actual audiences really resonating with these two women after seeing their talks live.
Sweeney and Rasikh both have very distinctive audiences they are speaking to and very different styles of going about their discussions. Interestingly, the main audience for both talks appears to be women. While the category that Sweeney’s talk was aimed at could be as broad as “parents” and Rasikh definitely commended fathers who value their daughters, it seemed to me that the main focus of both talks was predominantly women.
ReplyDeleteIt was interesting watch these two talk back-to-back as each speaker had such differing presentation techniques. Personally, I think each talk works equally well because of the difference in audience, topic and presentation style, and each speaker excellently resonates with her audience, although the type and depth of resonation that the audience experienced cannot truly be compared.
Sweeney’s talk focuses in on parenthood and those difficult questions kids ask and adults must answer, particularly questions about sex. As she recalls what starts as an innocent conversation with her daughter for the audience, nearly verbatim, a feeling of mutual understanding and commiseration, so to speak, sweeps over the audience. She was a very engaging speaker and her use of humor was extremely engaging. As she recants the story to the audience in which she unknowingly leads her eight-year-old down a naughty path, each parent in the room is groaning with her, as they have all experienced moments like this. I would argue that her main weapon in this presentation was pathos, as this is what connects Sweeney to her audience as a relatable speaker and parent.
Rasikh’s talk had a completely different tone and strategy that was effective in its own way. In contrast to Sweeney’s humorous opener, Rasikh began with a sobering story about her childhood that immediately puts into perspective how much Americans take for granted our free, legal education. Her presentation was mostly based on personal stories that appeal to the pathos of the audience because of the fear of being killed she lived through just to go to school. Her speech works because she speaks from experience – any other attempt at this presentation would fail because it would completely lack the ethos Rasikh has and the audience would feel as though they were being preached at. Her speech also works because it empowers the audience. It empowers Americans to value their educations, it empowers parents to see the worth in their children and it empowers people to support the cause about which she is passionate.
Overall, I found myself engaged for the entirety of each presentation; I was captivated by Sweeney’s presentation and moved by the talk Rasikh gave. Though their techniques were different, they were appropriate for each speaker’s audience and successfully conveyed the message each presenter was trying to make.
Julia Sweeney captured the true essence of resonating your audience by sharing a story that was easily relatable to many parents whom are also trying to give their own version of “The Talk” to their child. Sweeney placed herself in those parent’s shoes where she was able to explore their worries and concerns. During this talk, she revealed many flawed moments, such as misinforming her daughter that women carry a similar pond where frogs inhabit in their own body, showing her daughter videos of animals mating, and ultimately misleading her child to believe that there are no such videos that show human engaging in sexual reproduction. These imperfections gathered the audience’s attention and made them feel sympathetic towards her. Sweeney’s weaknesses depicted reality, which shaped a genuine image that was very likeable for the audience.
ReplyDeleteI admire her ability to tackle this difficult and awkward situation by telling the experience in such a charismatic and humorous manner. Sweeney changed her voice when she referenced her daughter’s demanding questions. Her body language was dramatic and exaggerated, as you can tell by her eyes widening when she acted out her daughter’s absurdity. She also created a light-hearted mood throughout the presentation, which made it easy to follow her story. Her success in engaging with her audience was her ability to create a warm, conversational tone. As she shared her story, she made me feel like I was in a cozy café and we are both chatting about our personal stories over a good cup of coffee.
In the “Dare to Educate Afghan Girls,” Shabana Basij-Rasikh did not have a strong, commanding presence on stage. The story had a slow start and it wasn’t an immediate attention grabber. Her skills as a presentor were a bit dull and dry due to her lack of movement and facial expressions. Even though she wasn’t the greatest presentor, she was able to compensate her lack of skills by identifying the shared belief between the presentor and listener. In our readings from Resonate, Duarte says a presentor’s main goal is to connect his or her ideas to what the audience cared about, which is what Rasikh was able to achieve with her audience. The shared belief is the importance of getting free-access to education for everyone and this idea is the underlying link. She also gave descriptive details that immediately stirred a vivid image in your mind. You didn’t need pictures to help you understand the difficulties she went through. Rasikh’s inspirational story ended with a successful accomplishment, which helped her easily gain the audience’s approval because people love to hear a good story where the hero becomes a winner.
There were some similar strategies that both Julia Sweeney and Shabana Basij-Rasikh used to communicate their ideas to the audience and resonate with them, yet there were also some differences between them. Both presentations were effective in engaging the audience through storytelling and sharing their own personal experiences, which brought forth a strong sense of pathos; however, both approached the stage and expressed themselves much differently than each other. In Julia’s presentation, she was able to capture the audience’s full attention by illustrating her idea of having “the talk” with a single story or experience that she personally had with her 8 year old daughter. It kept the audience engaged because Julia was very expressive in her voice and in her hand gestures. She was able to relate and create a sense of common ground with the audience she was presenting to. The audience consists predominately of the middle-aged and older generation, old enough to have encountered the same kind of challenge that Julia experienced one way or another, may it have been their own children, their grandchildren, or even their nephews or nieces.
ReplyDeleteUnlike Julia’s presentation, Shabana followed a different approach in presenting her ideas because the topic that she spoke on was not something that could be as comical as Julia’s presentation. She spoke rather monotonously, with no body gestures at all, but the power of the words that she used had a strong enough impact to keep the audience engaged and attentive. She frequently used pauses throughout her presentation in order have her words and ideas soak in more deeply into the audience’s emotion, resonating within them with a great sense of pathos. Also, the pictures that Shabana portrayed throughout her presentation were extremely effective because each photograph brought life into the illustrations that she created through her words. It magnified the emotional appeal to the audience, which only helped Shabana’s presentation to resonate more deeply within them.
In both of the TED talks, “The Talk” by Julia Sweeney and “Dare to Educate Afghan Girls” by Shabana Basij-Rasikh, certain approaches were used by the speakers to resonate with the audience. The speakers each addressed completely different subjects, but underneath it all, the foundation of the presentation was made applicable to the audience.
ReplyDeleteThe first TED talk I watched was “The Talk,” which I found the audience to find humorous and definitely something to be able to relate to. Sweeney addresses an awkward conversation that all parents may have experienced before or sometime will face when their child(ren) begin asking questions about sex. This quickly makes the topic relatable to the audience. Sweeney repeats the conversation between her and her daughter, almost word for word. This makes the talk easy to follow along, especially when she uses humor. I think this was a great choice for Sweeney to make because many in the audience were laughing, perhaps thinking of their own memories of “The Talk” they had with their children. I believe the choice of topic Sweeney used was a wise choice, as it was easily relatable to her audience, who I think were mostly all parents, and something that many seemed to find fond memories about.
On a different note, and completely unlike Sweeney’s talk, Shabana Basij-Rasikh spoke about a personal memory of hers that I believe was very heart-warming to hear. Although her story was very personal and emotional, I find her to be more uncomfortable on stage when she speaks from the other speakers we have seen so far. However, I overlook this when I get further into her presentation and see how passionate she is about girls getting an education in Afghanistan. Basij-Rasikh used two primary appeals in her speech, which were pathos and ethos. I could definitely sense her emotion about the subject and her strong passion as she presented the information. It was also obvious that at times her facial appearance showed her love for this and how passionate she was for her topic. I believe that her audience consisted of people who have been given a good education and don’t need to fight for it. This makes it relatable to the audience, especially if they have taken their education for granted at times, because she is telling a story about thousands of girls who would risk their lives just to get an education like I have for free in America. Mostly though, I think Basij-Rasikh wanted her audience to know that not everyone has it easy as many others do and to open their mind to other parts of the world that still struggle with gender equality.
Overall, I definitely found of the presentations by these women to be very fascinating and fun to analyze the speakers. I found out that both emotional and humorous approaches to presentations could still have a great effect on an audience. However, there is a certain strategy/approach that should be used when addressing a specific topic that I believe both Sweeney and Basij-Rasikh used perfectly when addressing their topics.
I really enjoyed how both speakers, Julia Sweeney and Shabana Basij-Rasikh, used the same rhetorical devices, but in very different ways. They used them to best suit their points they were trying to get across, and to better suit their audiences. In both talks their use of these devices was very effective, but for different reasons.
ReplyDeleteJulia Sweeney obviously relied more on the humor angle of pathos to tell her story. Every parent can identify with the awkward story she told, so her story, an already funny one, became even funnier when she added to it with her facial expressions and narration. She emphasized the awkward build-up to the funnier parts of her story, enhancing the hilarity of the situation, which definitely played to her audience. The story of “the talk” is a familiar one to all parents, which can be a danger to comedians retelling it, simply because it is so known. Yet Sweeney kept it interesting, adding a fresh take on an old but never boring story.
Shabana Basij-Rasikh, on the other hand, had a more somber, sad story, so she played more into the sad emotion side of pathos. While she did not have as much stage presence and confidence as Sweeney, this almost made her seem more genuine, less about the show of the presentation and more about her passion for the topic she was discussing. She was able to tell her story without making it obnoxiously all about her, which is very difficult to do when talking about oneself. Her story, and her obvious investment and passion in it, was enough to make her audience of mostly women captivated with her story, which opened up a world of inequality and danger most likely completely unfamiliar to most of the women in her audience.
Overall, I think it was very useful to see two people give very different types of presentations to different audiences, and to see the effects of those presentations on their audiences.
Both speakers effectively portray their message to the audience, but do so in highly contrasting ways. Julia Sweeney appeals to the audience greatly through pathos. The subject is a relatable one, for both older and younger members; the older remembering when they had to go through “The Talk” with their youngsters, the more youthful remembering the discomfort of sitting through such a discussion with – how horrifying – their parents. Universally awkward, the humor is there naturally. Sweeney conveys her story action by action, leading the audience through the journey she carefully traversed with her daughter. The facial expressions used, the voice inflections, the laughter, the hand gestures – she engages the audience and allows them to experience it with her, to cringe at the touchy parts, to laugh at the blunders. The way that Sweeney tells the story, too, indicates that the story is going somewhere. It builds and builds, ending finally with Sweeney realizing she had led her daughter to the world of internet porn in all the innocence of eight year old curiosity. And it is at that point that Sweeney lies to her daughter, and all the audience relates to it, because it is such a horrendous, funny thing to have done in the pursuit of simply being honest with her daughter. The audience understands, which is a bit part of what makes this presentation work. They can place their selves in her shoes; they have been there. She holds a certain amount of ethos, too. She herself experienced this, she was the mother who had to deal with her daughter’s questions. She is not just repeating a story, never having to actually deal with such a circumstance before. This gives it a greater credibility and allows greater empathy to be produced from the audience – again, an emotional bond between presenter and audience.
ReplyDeleteShabana Basij-Rasikh has a greater amount of ethos connected with her presentation that allows her message to resonate with her audience. While she lacks the stage presence Sweeney holds, she still manages to captivate her audience through the use of her personal story. She establishes her ethos from the start, while also applying pathos. The depiction of her struggle for education, the perils connected with it, pulls the audience in and establishes yet another emotional bond between speaker and audience, which is strengthened as she tells of other stories, those who have faced a similar experience and have dealt with the struggles and terror involved. Basij-Rasikh also applies a certain amount of logos throughout, smattering in facts and statistics concerning women attending school in Afghanistan. Yet she manages to sustain what Duarte establishes is necessary – the interaction between facts and personalization, which allows her presentation to steadily hold the audience. She uses all three elements – pathos, ethos, logos – effectively to maintain the attention of her audience. She reaches out to them emotionally, she asserts her credibility through having lived through what she is discussing, and she works in the figures that make her point more powerful.
Basij-Rasikh resonates with the audience by making the story a story of humanity, rather than only about her and her culture. She begins with a story in the context of family, which is something virtually every human can relate to. By relating the conversation about the news between her and her father, she appeals to the natural human affinity for good father-daughter relationships. Because her father says a message of hope in the context of the quote, "the news usually depressed him," Basij-Rasikh resolves a tension (leads us quickly from oppression to relief) which is cathartically satisfying for the audience. She later describes her father explaining to her that she can only keep what is in her head. This scene is depicted as a wise man imparting profound and even spiritual knowledge to a young, doubting hero who needs encouragement, making the scene larger than life, intuitively “true,” and quite engaging. Finally, she explicitly addresses the need for a good father, something that the women in the audience would easily relate to - either because they wish they had that good relationship with their father and are moved with affection for Basij-Rasikh's father, or because they, too, had a good father, and know how powerful his validation was/is. The presentation applies what our textbook describes as “segmenting” the audience – it seems that she focused on having a personal conversation with women that also applies to the men in the audience. Though it is female-oriented, she explains that the support of men is quite necessary, thus involving both genders. Most importantly, as mentioned, even though Basij-Rasikh's story is from a different culture, she made it resonate with the audience by focusing on stories about family relationships that everyone can relate to.
ReplyDeleteSweeney’s talk resonates with the segment of the audience that has children, for the most part. It also broadly relates to all audience members, since most adults are aware of the controversy of when to explain sex to one’s child, and all members have been children. Anyways, assuming the majority of the audience are parents, they can all resonate with this story because their child(ren) probably asked the same question(s). Because of the common ground between Sweeney and the audience, humor was made possible – adults who “know” looking over the kid’s head and laughing at the child’s honesty and ignorance, kind of humor. The progression of the story into dangerous territory keeps the audience in suspense as they wonder, “how far is this lady going to go with the ‘talk’?!” Finally, Sweeney ends with relief of not going “too” far, resolving the tension. More than anything, the story engages audience members because the juxtaposition of an 8-year-old and sex both makes you laugh and troubles you. I wanted to see what would happen. It was also cathartic to hear about a mother giving the “talk” so honestly and so soon or even giving it at all; a relief to vicariously get it out in the open.
Both TED talk speakers utilize the appeal of pathos in order to resonate with their audience. However, the way they carry that out greatly differs. Julia Sweeney immediately draws her audience in with her charisma and high energy. She exerts ethos through her assertion that she is a mother, which gives her an authority and the audience an understanding that she has credibility when talking about her experiences. She particularly connects with parents in the audience, especially mothers, who have probably gone through the same uncomfortable conversation. Her confident, approachable way of story-telling has the audience engaged and laughing immediately. The story has universally relatable moments that a wide range of people can connect to; anyone who has found themselves in an “uh-oh” moment. The usage of pathos is consistently strong throughout the presentation, through the firsthand re-telling of an instance in the speaker’s personal life. She garnered a sense of sympathy from the audience at the end, when Sweeney realizes that she’s dug herself into a hole when doing her best to answer her daughter’s questions.
ReplyDeleteIn contrast, Rasikh had none of the expressiveness that Sweeney’s presentation relied heavily on. Instead, she exuded a quiet sense of strength and independence that helped her to connect with the audience. She didn’t have a captivating stage presence in the same sense as Sweeney, where the audience was immediately engaged. Instead, she built a slow connection with the audience through her life story. She had a quiet sense of authority, and held herself with dignity, utilizing ethos in order to establish herself as an authoritative advocate for girls’ right to an education. Though it could be argued she didn’t have enough energy or excitement on stage, I believe she didn’t try to alter her personality or put on a facade. I felt like I was drawn right into her family and way of life back in Afghanistan, and I appreciated that she didn’t exaggerate or overtly try to manipulate the audience’s emotions. The audience clearly resonated anyway, as the short clip panning to a woman in the crowd showed. Her reaction to the story was the same as mine- “Oh, wow.”