Audience analysis Essay

1. Identify several controversial issues debated in your workplace, community or on campus. -The issue of the legitimacy of homosexual marriage is certainly on people’s minds.   It relates to questions of personal liberty and civic requirements imposed by the state, the right to choose, as well as fundamental issues related to marriage as an institution. -Universal health insurance is talked about and people are pretty strong divided about whether it would work and even be effective. -Whether we’re in a depression is argued pretty strongly, a lot of people don’t think that this is a problem because they talk about cycles and just about being on the wrong point on the cycle.   Other people are increasingly worried and predict that the situation will get much worse and that it is a depression but we only act like it’s not a depression due partially to increased credit availability. 2.Identify a policy or practice you would like to see changed at your workplace, community or on campus. -The equal employment act is kind of an issue because it’s successfully manipulated by a few people with access to good lawyers but is detrimental to people just entering the work force because the act makes it harder to fire someone.   Also, there’s possibly an increase of bias because employers will selectively fire people who would not sue and often times they deserve to sue more than people who do sue.   It’s a great abstract idea but it’s very variable and at times promotes both inefficient hiring and firing practices. 3.Select one issue, policy or practice as the topic for your persuasive speech. Should social security be privatized?(Yes) 4.Describe the rhetorical situation for your public speech. What features of the speech setting are important to consider in preparing your speech? The rhetorical situation is that I’d have to be convincing with sharp arguments that are crisply delivered.   As it’s a public speech the language would have to be very conventional and not have regionalism driven in too much in case it would be too distracting for various members of the audience.   Engagement is crucial, balancing myself with the surroundings is helpful.  Ã‚   It’s usually extremely useful to be very aware of where the speech will be delivered because extreme clashes or even minor clashes are disruptive and distracting. If my speech setting is a classroom the language could be more informal and include more jokes.   If it’s in a space where movement is very free and people could walk out anytime it would have to be much more planned out and well-executed.   Visual engagements are often times critical and knowing about the audio-visual equipment is extremely helpful so that preparations can be made to have everything run as smoothly as possible. 5.Identify your audience and discuss the demographic factors that may influence how you address your topic. My audience is my peers.   They are just entering the work force or have entered it on a more informal basis.   Most of my peers have faced a lot of frustrations related to jobs and their extreme inaccessibility.   During tough economic times young adults are usually the hardest hit because they have the least security and are given far fewer social services than the elderly. 6.Make a list of the questions you would like to ask members of your audience. 1. Would your grandparents fund a public school or would they move someplace where they wouldn’t have to? 2. If you grew up in a family-oriented neighborhood where schools really mattered did you come into contact with elderly volunteers who seemed to care about you? 3. How would you feel if you found out that social security operates exactly like a pyramid scheme and that most people under the age of 40 do not expect to receive anything from social security? 4. Would you voluntarily pay for other people’s retirements if you had a choice? 5. Have you noticed that your social security tax on your paycheck is often higher than your monthly cell-phone bill every month? 7.Why is it important to conduct an audience analysis? It’s essential for being prepared enough to give useful information and what’s useful depends on what they’re concerned about.   What truly interacts with their life and what really does have a formative impact on the choices they would make and the motivation they would have towards a lot of important life-steps. If I don’t do an audience analysis I could also risk alienating the audience if I talk about something they’re completely unfamiliar with or if I talk about something that is extremely disturbing or boring for my audience.   For example, if I talked about social security privatization to an older audience about to benefit or already benefiting I would not mention a lot of things that I would mention to people in my peer group.   An offended audience is probably one of the worst-case scenarios that could result and it’s a bad experience for both parties involved. To think about what the audience would have to deal with on a daily basis, what relates to issues that impact them in a significant way, and last of all, what would help them listen to what I have to say.   The audience never pays attention in an automatic way and a lot of competency needs to be earned, speeches are critical because they’re a great job-skill to have and also necessitate that more thought is given to how I present myself and what even persuades me.   If I choose a topic that’s unappealing to me it will most likely be the case that it will be infectious. If I properly try to analyze my audience at least I’d be better cued towards sensitivities and preferences.   Both are extremely important to be aware of as one relates to things I could say that could result in insult and the other is important because to be a truly persuasive speaker there’s a lot of interaction.   The audience also enjoys interaction and sitting still is often hard to many people, particularly when a speech is too irrelevant.   Audience awareness would in most situations allow for a speaker to feel prepared and to also have prompted a motivation to prepare.