Not One, But All FIVE

I would like to discuss The Five Cannons of Rhetoric.  Whenever you prepare a speech you usually prepare an outline, what I refer to as the “I” form, which includes an introduction, body, and conclusion.  Well this may seem like the only consideration an individual has in preparing their speech, but that couldn’t be farther from the truth.  It is actually third on the orderly list of speech or communication.  First there is invention.  This is where a speaker needs to decide a topic, what can be said about this topic and how does the speaker want to approach persuading or informing their audience on this topic.  It is in the area of invention that ethos, pathos and logos first come into play.  Second of the cannons is style, what tone the speaker wants to set for his/her speech.  Considerations may be: conversational, philosophical yet not quite formal, or formal and very ornate.  Now then we arrive at the actual writing or arrangement of the speech.  This is the point where a speaker prepares the basic organization of the speech.  Now then a speaker may do all this pre-work and forget a very important aspect of speech giving, especially if one has chosen their style to be of a casual tone, memorization.  This does not necessarily mean to memorize the speech word for word, as a speech may then come out robotic, stiff and well sounding memorized and not real. Just memorize the main points, keywords and phrases in the order the speech was arranged.  This will allow the speech to flow easily for both the speaker and the audience.  Last, but oh so far from least is the delivery.  This is the coordination of both non-verbal skills and verbal presentation.  The delivery can make or break a speech.

The Fur-Kid