Technique in Speeches

Consider the actor: she plays a role foriegn to her, digesting lines from Shakespeare, Williams, or Albe, all the while demonstrating the nuanced emotions of her character. As American began to suburbanize in the 1950s, a new style of acting, as it were, emerged on stages across the country. Instead of "feelers," namely people who would present the characteristics of the perons primarily through emotions and general pathos, "technique-supporters" began to dominate the state. These technique invested actors used dramatic theory to protray their character: they would break down the chunks of dialogue into groups of function. This means, they aimed to delinated where the character wanted to sound pround, sad, or paranoid. The age of function challenged the "feelers" for the best method of presenting a character: one side aimed to capture the emotion while the other attempted to capture the motive. The battle between "feelers" and "techies" continued for years.


And the "techies" won. I use this ancedote to preface a large question of presenting in more natural settings. Surely, we are not usually asked to sit on stage underneath blinding lights and become someone else, instead we are asked to present in a slightly less daunting fashion-- daily communication. As a speaker, it is important to remember that most of the gitters we get can be controlled from the "outside-in", which means that the technique we use helps guide our emotional responses to public speaking.

Four key areas:
-Breath
-Resonance
-Support (Planting)
-Articulation

To control our breath, and our gitters, we must expand our rib cages and feel that nice deep and low breath come into our bodies. For example, cover your nose and mouth, then expand your stomach as wide as possible. Now release. We feel a surge of air just flow into our bodies without our necks tensing or our shoulders reaching new heights. This is just a step towards becoming more natural speakers and finding our unquivered voice. Here's an article that greatly expands on breathing and the other four key areas of delivering a speech:

http://speakingcenter.uncg.edu/resources/tipsheets/speakinganxiety/techniquesformanagingpublicspeaking.pdf

These tools will hopefully drive you into an uncomfortable area of "conscious incompetance" which then becomes "conscious competance" then "unconcious competance." Delivering speeches with technique amplifies our voice and gives us a more refined method of communication.