This chapter is adapted from Stand up, Speak out: The Practice and Ethics of Public Speaking, CC BY-NC-SA 4.0.

What is the importance of language in my speech?

Now that you have a good grasp of how you can help your audience to listen to your speech, let’s see how your language choice influences their listening skills as well.

The words we choose are symbols for the meanings we wish to convey. I wish I could open your head and pour in my meanings. It would be so much easier and more accurate than trying to find a word that delivers the exact same meaning I have in my mind. Check out this PowerPoint to see what I’m talking about. It is foundational to helping you choose your words for your speeches.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEgLswzKs5w

Perception Lecture Source, by Communication 1020 Videso, Standard YouTube License. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEgLswzKs5w

Ask any professional speaker or speech writer, and they will tell you that language matters. For example, below are some of the most important and memorable lines in American history from speeches given by American presidents:

It is true that you may fool all the people some of the time; you can even fool some of the people all the time; but you can’t fool all of the people all the time– Abraham Lincoln (McClure, 1904).

Speak softly and carry a big stick–Theodore Roosevelt (Roosevelt, 1901).

The only thing we have to fear is fear itself–Franklin Delano Roosevelt (Roosevelt, 1933).

Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country–John F. Kennedy (Kennedy, 1961).

We lose ourselves when we compromise the very ideals that we fight to defend. And we honor those ideals by upholding them not when it’s easy, but when it is hard–Barack Obama (Obama, 2009).

You don’t have to be a president or a famous speaker to use language effectively. So, in this chapter, we’re going to explore the importance of language. First, we will discuss the difference between oral and written language, then we will talk about some basic guidelines for using language, and lastly, we’ll look at six key language elements.

What is the difference between oral and written language?

When we use the word language, we are referring to the words you choose to use in your speech—so by definition, our focus is on spoken language. Spoken language has always existed prior to written language. Wrench, McCroskey, and Richmond suggest that if you think about humans’ language history as a twelve-inch ruler, written language or recorded language has only existed for the “last quarter of an inch” (Wrench, et al., 2008). Furthermore, of the more than six thousand languages that are spoken around the world today, only a minority actually use a written alphabet (Lewis, 2009). To help us understand the importance of language, we will first look at language’s basic functions and then delve into the differences between oral and written language.

Basic Functions of Language

Language is any formal system of gestures, signs, sounds, and symbols used or conceived as a means of communicating thought. As mentioned above, there are over six thousand language schemes currently used around the world. Mandarin is the language spoken by the most people on the planet; other widely spoken languages are English, Spanish, and Arabic (Lewis, 2009). Language is ultimately important because it is the primary means through which humans have the ability to communicate and interact with one another. Some linguists go so far as to suggest that acquiring language skills is the primary advancement that enabled our prehistoric ancestors to flourish and succeed over other hominid species (Mayell, 2003).

In today’s world, effective language use helps us in our interpersonal relationships at home and at work and will improve your ability to be an effective public speaker. Because language is an important aspect of public speaking that many students don’t spend enough time developing, we encourage you to take advantage of this chapter.

One of the first components necessary for understanding language is to understand how we assign meaning to words. Words consist of oral sounds and written shapes that have agreed-upon meanings based in concepts, ideas, and memories. When we write the word blue, we may be referring to a portion of the visual spectrum dominated by energy with a wavelength of roughly 440–490 nanometers. You could also say that the color in question is an equal mixture of both red and green light. While both are technically correct, we’re pretty sure that neither of these definitions is how you thought about the word. When hearing the word blue, you may have thought of your favorite color, the color of the sky on a spring day, or the color of a really ugly car you saw in the parking lot. When you think about language, be aware that there are two different meaning types to consider: denotative and connotative.

Denotative Meaning

Denotative meaning is the specific meaning associated with a word—sometimes referred to as the dictionary definition. The definitions provided above for the word blue are examples that might be found in a dictionary. The first dictionary was written by Robert Cawdry in 1604 and was called Table Alphabeticall. This English language dictionary consisted of three thousand commonly spoken English words. Today, the Oxford English Dictionary contains more than 200,000 words (Oxford University Press, 2011).

Connotative Meaning

Connotative meaning is the idea suggested by or associated with a word. In addition to the examples above, the word blue can evoke many other ideas:

• State of depression—feeling blue.
• Indicates winning—a blue ribbon.
• Side during the Civil War—blues vs. grays.
• Sudden event—out of the blue.

We also associate the color blue with the sky and the ocean. Maybe your school colors or your archrival’s colors include blue. There are also various forms of blue: aquamarine, baby blue, navy blue, royal blue, and so on.

Some miscommunication can occur over denotative meanings. For example, imagine receiving a flyer for a tennis center open house. The center’s expressed goal is to introduce children to the game of tennis. At the bottom of the flyer, the language used encourages people “to bring their own racquets if they have them,” but “a limited number of racquets will be available.” The final phrase’s denotative meaning could be interpreted in multiple ways: some parents attending the event may perceive it to mean that loaner racquets will be available to use during the open house event, when really the tennis court people intended it to mean that parents could purchase racquets onsite. The confusion over the denotative meaning could hurt the tennis center, as some parents could feel they had been misled by the flyer and may leave the event!

Although denotatively based misunderstandings such as in the example indeed happen, most communication misunderstandings occur because of differing connotative meanings. For example, you may be trying to persuade your audience to support public funding for a new professional football stadium in your city, but if mentioning the team or owner’s name creates negative connotations for the audience, you will not be very persuasive. The potential for misunderstanding connotative meaning is an additional reason why audience analysis, discussed earlier in this book, is critically important. By conducting effective audience analysis, you know in advance how your audience might respond to your words and ideas’ connotations. Connotative meanings can not only differ between individuals interacting at the same time but also differ greatly across time periods and cultures. Ultimately, speakers should attempt to have a working knowledge of how their audiences could potentially interpret words and ideas to minimize the chance of miscommunication.

Twelve Ways Oral and Written Language Differ

A second important aspect to understand about language is that oral language used in public speaking and written language used for texts do not function the same way. Try a brief experiment. Take a textbook, maybe even this one, and read it out loud. When the text is read aloud, does it sound conversational? Probably not. Written language uses larger vocabulary and is more formal. Public speaking, on the other hand, should sound like a conversation. McCroskey, Wrench, and Richmond highlight the following twelve characteristics that oral language uses:

1. A smaller variety of words.
2. Words with fewer syllables.
3. Shorter sentences.
4. More self-reference words: I, me, mine.
5. Fewer quantifying terms or precise numerical words.
6. More pseudo-quantifying terms: many, few, some.
7. More extreme and superlative words: none, all, every, always, never.
8. More qualifying statements: clauses beginning with unless and except.
9. More repetition of words and syllables.
10. More contractions.
11. More interjections: “Wow!,” “Really?,” “No!,” “You’re kidding!”.
12. More colloquial and nonstandard words (McCroskey, et al., 2003).

The differences between oral and written communication exist primarily because people listen to and read information differently. First, when you read information, if you don’t grasp content the first time, you have the ability to reread a section. When we are listening to information, we do not have the ability to “rewind” life and relisten to the information. Second, when you read information, if you do not understand a concept, you can look up the concept in a dictionary or online and gain the knowledge easily. However, we do not always have easy access to the Internet to look up concepts that we don’t understand. Therefore, oral communication should be simple enough to be easily understood in the moment, by a specific audience, without additional study or information.

How can I use language effectively in my speech?

When considering how to use language effectively in your speech, consider the degree to which the language is appropriate, vivid, inclusive, and familiar. The next section defines each of these language aspects and discusses why each is important in public speaking.

Use Appropriate Language

In life, we behave in ways appropriate for the circumstances. The same applies to the language we use. Appropriateness is one of the first concepts a speechmaker needs to think about when considering what language to use. By appropriate, we mean whether the language is suitable or fitting for the speaker, the audience, the speaking context, and the topic.

Appropriate for the Speaker

One of the first questions to ask yourself is whether your speech’s language fits with your own speaking pattern. Not all language choices are appropriate for all speakers. The language you select should be suitable for you, not someone else. If you’re a first-year college student, there’s no need to force yourself to sound like an astrophysicist even if you are giving a speech on new planets. One of the biggest mistakes novice speakers make is thinking that they have to use million-dollar words because it makes them sound smarter. Actually, million-dollar words don’t tend to function well in oral communication to begin with, so using them will probably make you uncomfortable. Also, it may be difficult for the audience to understand your words’ nuances and can increase the risk of denotative or connotative misunderstandings.

Appropriate for the Audience

The second question to ask is whether the language you choose is appropriate for your specific audience. Let’s say that you’re an engineering student. If you’re giving a presentation to an engineering class, you can use language that other engineering students will know. On the other hand, if you use engineering vocabulary in a public speaking class, many audience members will not understand you. As another example, if you are speaking about the Great Depression to a young-adult audience, you can’t assume they will know the meaning of terms like “New Deal” and “WPA,” which would be familiar to a senior-citizen audience. In this text’s other chapters, we explain the importance of audience analysis—once again, audience analysis is a key factor to consider when choosing your speech’s language.

Appropriate for the Context

The third question to ask about appropriateness is whether the language you use is suitable or fitting for the context itself. The language you employ if you’re addressing an auditorium full of high school students will differ from the language you employ addressing a hotel ballroom full of business people. If you’re giving a speech at an outdoor rally, you cannot use the same language you would use in a classroom. Recall that the speaking context includes the occasion, the time of day, the audiences’ mood, physical location, and other factors. Take the entire speaking context into consideration when you make language choices for your speech.

Appropriate for the Topic

The fourth and final question to ask is whether the language is appropriate for your specific topic. If you are speaking about The Walt Disney Company’s early years, would you refer to Walt Disney as a “thaumaturgic” individual, i.e., one who works wonders or miracles? While the word thaumaturgic may be accurate, is it the most appropriate for the topic at hand? As another example, if your speech topic is about the dual residence model of string theory, it makes sense to expect that you will use more sophisticated language than if your topic is about a basic introduction to the physics of, say, sound or light waves.

Use Vivid Language

After appropriateness, the second main guideline for language choice is to use vivid language. Vivid language helps your listeners create strong, distinct, clear, and memorable mental images. Good vivid language helps your audience truly understand and imagine what you are saying. Two common ways to create a more vivid speech is by using imagery and rhythm.

Imagery

Imagery is using language to represent objects, actions, or ideas. The goal of imagery is to help an audience member create a mental picture of what a speaker is saying. A speaker who uses imagery successfully will tap into one or more of the audience’s five basic senses: hearing, taste, touch, smell, and sight. Three common tools of imagery are concreteness, simile, and metaphor.

Concreteness

When we use language that is concrete, we help our audience see specific realities or actual instances instead of abstract theories and ideas. The goal of concreteness is to help you, as a speaker, show your audience something instead of just telling them. Imagine you’ve decided to give a speech on the importance of freedom. You could easily stand up and talk about the philosophical work of Rudolf Steiner, who divided the ideas of freedom into freedom of thought and freedom of action. If you’re like us, even reading that sentence can make you want to go to sleep. Instead of defining what those terms mean and discussing Steiner’s philosophical merits, you could use real examples in which people’s freedom to think or freedom to behave has been stifled. For example, you could talk about how Afghani women under Taliban rule have been denied access to education, and how those seeking education have risked public flogging and even execution (Iacopino & Rasekh, 1998). You could further illustrate how Afghani women under the Taliban are forced to adhere to rigid interpretations of Islamic law that functionally limit their behavior. These examples illustrate Steiner’s philosophy, make your language more concrete, and are easier to remember. Ultimately, the goal of concreteness is to show an audience something instead of talking about it abstractly.

Simile

The second form of imagery is simile. As you probably learned in English courses, a simile is a figure of speech in which two unlike things are explicitly compared. Both aspects being compared remain separate within the comparison. The following are some examples:

• The thunderous applause was like a party among the gods.
• After the revelation, she was as angry as a raccoon caught in a cage.
• Love is like a battlefield.

When we look at these two examples, you’ll see that two words have been italicized: like and as. All similes contain either like or as within the comparison. Speakers use similes to help an audience understand a specific characteristic being described within the speech. In the first example, we are connecting the type of applause being heard to something supernatural, so we can imagine that the applause was huge and enormous. Now, think how you would envision the event if the simile likened the applause to a mime convention—your mental picture changes dramatically, doesn’t it?

To effectively use similes within your speech, first look for instances where you find yourself using the words like or as—for example, “His breath smelled like a fishing boat on a hot summer day.” Second, when you find situations where you are comparing two things using like or as, examine what it is that you are actually comparing. For example, maybe you’re comparing someone’s breath to the odor of a fishing vessel. Lastly, once you see what two ideas you are comparing, check the mental picture for yourself. Are you getting the mental image you desire? Is the image too strong? Is the image too weak? You can always alter the image to make it stronger or weaker depending on what your aim is.

Metaphor

The other commonly used form of imagery is the metaphor or a figure of speech. Metaphor is when a term or phrase is applied to something in a nonliteral way to suggest a resemblance. One of the comparison items is said to be the other, even though this is realistically not possible. Let’s look at a few examples:

• Love is a battlefield.
• Upon hearing the charges, the accused clammed up and refused to speak without a lawyer.
• Every year, a new crop of activists is born.

In these examples, the comparison word has been italicized. Let’s think through each example. In the first one, the comparison is the same as one of our simile examples except that the word like is omitted—instead of being like a battlefield, the metaphor states that love is a battlefield, and it is understood that the speaker does not mean the comparison literally. In the second example, the accused clams up, which means that the accused refused to talk in the same way a clam shell is closed. In the third example, we refer to activists as crops that arise anew with each growing season, and we use born figuratively to indicate that they come into being—even though it is understood that they are not newborn infants at the time when they become activists.

To use a metaphor effectively, first determine what you are trying to describe. For example, maybe you are talking about a college catalog that offers various courses. Second, identify what it is that you want to say about the object you are trying to describe. Depending on whether you want your audience to think of the catalog as good or bad, you’ll use different words to describe it. Lastly, identify the other object you want to compare the first one to, which should mirror the intentions in the second step. Let’s look at two possible metaphors:

1. Students groped their way through the catalog’s maze of courses.
2. Students feasted on the catalog’s abundant courses.

While both of these examples evoke comparisons with the course catalog, the first example is clearly more negative and the second is more positive.

One mistake people make in using metaphors is to make two incompatible comparisons in the same sentence or line of thought. Here is an example:

• “That’s awfully thin gruel for the right wing to hang their hats on” (Nordquist, 2009).

This is known as a mixed metaphor, and it often has an incongruous or even hilarious effect. Unless you are aiming to entertain your audience with language’s fractured use, be careful to avoid mixed metaphors.

Rhythm

Our second guideline for effective speech language is to use rhythm, which makes most people think about music. What they may not realize is that language is inherently musical—at least it can be. Rhythm refers to the patterned, recurring movement of sound or speech. Whether someone is striking a drum with a stick or speaking in front of a group, both are creating rhythm. Think about your favorite public speaker. If you analyze his or her speaking pattern, you’ll notice that there is a certain cadence to the speech. While much of this cadence is a result of the nonverbal components of speaking, some of the cadence comes from the chosen language as well. Rhythm is an important aspect of human communication. Let’s examine four types of rhythmic language: parallelism, repetition, alliteration, and assonance.

Parallelism

When listing items in a sequence, audiences will respond more strongly when those ideas are presented in a grammatically parallel fashion, which is called parallelism. For example, look at the following two examples and determine which one sounds better to you:

1. Give me liberty, or I’d rather die.
2. Give me liberty, or give me death.

Technically, you’re saying the same thing in both, but the second sentence has rhythm due to the parallel construction of the phrase, give me. The lack of parallelism in the first example makes the sentence sound disjointed and ineffective.

Repetition

As we mentioned earlier in this chapter, repeating words and syllables is one of the major differences between oral and written language. For example, in persuasive speechmaking, speakers need to repeat the core message consistently. Repetition as a linguistic device is designed to help audiences become familiar with a short piece of the speech, as they hear it over and over again. By repeating a phrase during a speech, you create a specific rhythm. Probably the most famous and memorable use of repetition is Martin Luther King Jr.’s use of “I have a dream” in his speech at the Lincoln Memorial, August, 1963, during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. In that speech, King repeated the phrase “I have a dream” eight times, to great effect.

Alliteration

Another type of rhythmic language is alliteration, or repeating two or more words in a series that begin with the same consonant. In the Harry Potter novels, the author uses alliteration to name the four wizards who founded Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry: Godric Gryffindor, Helga Hufflepuff, Rowena Ravenclaw, and Salazar Slytherin. There are two basic types of alliteration: immediate juxtaposition and nonimmediate juxtaposition. Immediate juxtaposition occurs when the consonants clearly follow one after the other—as we see in the Harry Potter example. Nonimmediate juxtaposition occurs when the consonants are repeated in nonadjacent words, for example, “It is the poison that we must purge from our politics, the wall that we must tear down before the hour grows too late.” (Obama, 2008). Sometimes you can actually use examples of both immediate and nonimmediate juxtaposition within a single speech. The following example is from Bill Clinton’s acceptance speech at the 1992 Democratic National Convention: “Somewhere at this very moment, a child is being born in America. Let it be our cause to give that child a happy home, a healthy family, and a hopeful future” (Clinton, 2005).

Assonance

Assonance is similar to alliteration, but instead of relying on consonants, assonance gets its rhythm from repeating the same vowel sounds with different consonants in the stressed syllables. The phrase “how now brown cow,” which elocution students traditionally use to learn to pronounce rounded vowel sounds, is an example of assonance. While rhymes like “free as a breeze,” “mad as a hatter,” and “no pain, no gain” are examples of assonance, speakers should be wary of relying on assonance because when it is overused it can quickly turn into bad poetry.

Use Inclusive Language

Language can either inspire your listeners or turn them off very quickly. One of the fastest ways to alienate an audience is by using exclusive language. Instead, use inclusive language, which is language that avoids placing any one group of people above or below another group or groups. Let’s look at some common problem areas related to language regarding gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, and disabilities.

Gender-Specific Language

The first common form of exclusive language is that which privileges one of the sexes over the other and includes three common issues: using he as generic, using man to mean all humans, and gender-typing jobs.

Generic He

The generic he happens when a speaker labels all people within a group as he, when in reality there is a mixed-sex group involved. Consider the statement, “Every morning, when an officer of the law puts on his badge, he risks his life to serve and protect his fellow citizens.” In this case, we have a police officer who is labeled as male four different times in one sentence. Obviously, both male and female police officers risk their lives when they put on their badges. A better way to word the sentence would be, “Every morning, when law officers put on their badges, they risk their lives to serve and protect their fellow citizens.” Notice that in the nongeneric-he sentence, we made the subject plural—officers, and used the neutral pronouns they and their to avoid the generic he.

Use of Man

Traditionally, English speakers have used terms like man, mankind, and in casual contexts, guys when referring to both females and males. In the twentieth century’s second half, as society became more aware of language gender bias, organizations like the National Council of Teachers of English developed guidelines for nonsexist language (National Council of Teachers of English, 2002). For example, instead of using the word man, you could refer to the human race. Instead of saying, “hey, guys,” you could say, “OK, everyone.” By using gender-fair language you convey your meaning just as well, and you won’t risk alienating half your audience.

Gender-Typed Jobs

Another way that speakers alienate an audience is by using exclusive language that gender-types job titles. It is not unusual for people to assume, for example, that doctors are male and nurses are female. As a result, they may say, “She is a woman doctor,” or “He is a male nurse” when mentioning someone’s occupation, perhaps not realizing that the statements “she is a doctor” and “he is a nurse” already informs the listener of that person’s sex. Also, speakers sometimes use a gender-specific pronoun to refer to an occupation that has both males and females. See the Gender-Type Jobs list for some common, exclusive gender-specific job titles and more inclusive job titles.

Gender-Type Jobs

Ethnic Identity

Another type of exclusive language relates to categories used to highlight an individual’s ethnic identity. Ethnic identity refers to a group that an individual identifies with based on a common culture. For example, within the United States, we have numerous ethnic groups, including Italian American, Irish American, Japanese American, Vietnamese American, Cuban American, and Mexican American. Avoid statements that refer to a person’s ethnicity, such as “The committee is made up of four women and a Vietnamese man.” Instead say, “The committee is made up of four women and a man” or, if race and ethnicity are central to the discussion, you could say, “The committee is made up of three European American women, an Israeli American woman, a Brazilian American woman, and a Vietnamese American man.” In recent years, the trend is to avoid broad terms like Asians and Hispanics because these terms are not considered precise labels for the groups they actually represent. If you want to be safe, the best thing you can do is ask a couple of people who belong to an ethnic group how they prefer to label themselves.

Sexual Orientation

Another type of exclusive language is referred to as heterosexism. Heterosexism occurs when a speaker presumes that everyone in an audience is heterosexual or that opposite-sex relationships are the only norm. For example, a speaker might begin a speech by saying, “I am going to talk about the legal obligations you will have with your future husband or wife.” While this speech starts with the notion that everyone plans on getting married, which isn’t the case, it also assumes that everyone will label their significant others as either husbands or wives. Although, some members of the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender/transexual community will use these terms, others prefer more gender-neutral terms like spouse and partner. Moreover, legal obligations for same-sex couples may be very different from those for heterosexual couples. Notice also that we have used the phrase, members of the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender/transexual community, instead of the more clinical-sounding term, homosexual.

Disability

The last category of exclusive versus inclusive language that causes problems for some speakers relates to individuals with physical or mental disabilities. See how the Inclusive Language for Disabilities list provides some other examples of exclusive versus inclusive language.

Inclusive Language for Disabilities

What are the six important language elements for public speakers?

Language choice is one of the most important aspects of anyone’s public speaking performance and will determine how an audience experiences the speech. To help you think through your language choices, we are going to talk about six important language elements and how they affect audiences’ perceptions.

Clarity

The first important language element is clarity, which means to make sure the audience understands a speaker’s ideas in the way the speaker intended. While language, or verbal communication, is only one channel we use to transmit information, it can lend itself to numerous problems. For example, as discussed earlier, if people have different connotative definitions for words, the audience can miss the spearer’s intended meaning.

Imagine you’re listening to a speaker talking, and he or she uses the phrase, “older female relative who became aerodynamic venison road kill,” or “obese personification fabricated of compressed mounds of minute crystals.” If you’re like most people, these two phrases just went right over your head. We’ll give you a hint, these are two common Christmas songs. The first phrase refers to “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer,” and the second one is “Frosty the Snowman.” Notice that in both cases, the made-up title with all the polysyllabic words is far less clear than the commonly known one. While you are probably unlikely to deliberately distort your speech’s clarity by choosing such outlandish words to express simple thoughts, the point we are illustrating is that clear language makes a big difference in how well a message is understood.

Economy

The next important language element is economy, which means that less is best. Another common mistake among new public speakers is thinking that more words are more impressive. In fact, the opposite is true. When people ramble on and on without actually making a point, audiences become bored and distracted. To avoid this problem, we recommend word economy: use only those words necessary to accurately express your idea. If the fundamental idea you are trying to say is, “that stinks,” but you actually say “while the overall outcome may be undesirable and definitely not recommended,” that is overkill. We do have one caveat here: you want to make sure that your language isn’t so basic that it turns off your audience. If you are speaking to adults and use vocabulary appropriate for school children, you’ll end up offending your audience. So, while economy is definitely important, you don’t want to become so overly basic that you are perceived as “talking down” to your audience.

Obscenity

The third important language element is obscenity, or indecent language, which consists of curse words or pornographic references. While it may be fun to use obscene language in casual conversations with your friends, we cannot recommend using obscene language while delivering a speech. Even if you’re giving a speech related to an obscene word, you must be careful how you use the word itself. Whether we agree with societal perceptions of obscenity, going out of our way to use obscenity will end up focusing the audience on the obscenity and not on our message.

Obscure Language/Jargon

The fourth language element relates to using obscure language or jargon, which refers to special words or expressions that are used by a particular profession or group and are difficult for others to understand. If you must use jargon or obscure language, define the words upon first mention, which allows you to subsequently use the jargon or words in your speech because you can be certain the audience now understands the term.

Obscure language and jargon are two terms that closely relate to each other. Obscure language refers to language choices that are not typically understood or known by most of your audience. Imagine you’re listening to a speech and the speaker says, “Today, I’ve given you a plethora of ideas for greening your workplace.” While you may think the word plethora is commonly known, we can assure you that many people have no idea that plethora means many or an abundance of something. Similarly, you may think most people know what it means to “green” a workplace, but in fact many people do not know that it means to make the workplace more environmentally friendly or to reduce its environmental impact. In this example, plethora simply means the speaker has given many ideas for greening the workplace. You can still use the word plethora, but you should include a definition so that you’re sure your audience will understand.

Jargon, on the other hand, refers to language that is commonly used by a highly specialized group, trade, or profession. For example, legal jargon is used by lawyers and medical jargon is used by health care practitioners. The problem is that many speakers do not realize that jargon is group, trade, or profession specific and not used universally.

One common form of jargon is the acronym, a word formed by taking the first letters or groups of letters of words, such as NASDAQ—National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations, PET—positron emission tomography scan, or IHOP—International House of Pancakes. Another form of jargon is initialism, formed by pronouncing the initials rather than the name of an organization or other entity. For example, CDC—the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, fMRI—Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging, and B of A—Bank of America. In political discussions, you may come across various CFRs, or Codes of Federal Regulations. If you are going to use a specific acronym or initialism within your speech, you need to explain it the first time you use it. For example, you could say, “According to the United States Code of Federal Regulations, or CFR, employment discrimination in the Department of Homeland Security is not allowed based on biological sex, religion, sexual orientation, or race.” Furthermore, the US CFR does not permit discrimination in receiving contracts based on biological sex, religion, sexual orientation, or race

Power

The fifth language element is power, which is defined as an individual’s ability to influence another person to think or behave in a manner the other person would not have otherwise done. DeVito examines how language can be used to help people gain power over others or lose power over others (DeVito, 2009). The Powerful and Powerless Language list provides examples of powerful and powerless language that speakers can use during a speech. Powerless language should generally be avoided in public speaking because it can damage the speaker’s credibility.

Powerful and Powerless Language

Variety

The last important language element is variety, or a speaker’s ability to use and implement a range of different language choices. In many ways, variety encompasses all the characteristics of language previously discussed in this chapter. Often, speakers find one language device and then beat it into the ground like a railroad spike. Unfortunately, when a speaker starts using the same language device too often, the language device will start to lose the power that it may have had. For this reason, we recommend that you always think about the language you plan on using in a speech and make sure that you use a range of language choices.

References

Kennedy, J. F. (1961, January 20). Inaugural address. Quoted in Bartlett, J. (1992). Bartlett’s familiar quotations (J. Kaplan, Ed.) (16th ed.). Boston, MA: Little, Brown, & Company, p. 741.

University of Minnesota. (2011).  Stand up, Speak out: The Practice and Ethics of Public Speaking. University of Minnesota Libraries Publishing. https://open.lib.umn.edu/publicspeaking/. CC BY-SA 4.0.

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