Public Speaking Handbook

Becoming an Audience-centered Speaker 6 .1 97

the screwworm/castration speech. The parents were relieved. Fortunately, the
boys hadn’t understood it.
Williams’s downfall resulted from his failure to analyze his audience. He may
have had a clear objective in mind, but he hadn’t considered the background or
knowledge of his listeners. Audience analysis is essential for any successful speech.

Becoming an Audience-Centered

Speaker

6.1 List three steps in becoming an audience-centered speaker.

In Chapter 1, we identified the key elements in communication: source, receiver,
message, and channel. All four elements are important, but perhaps the most im-
portant is the receiver. In public speaking, the receiver is the audience, and the
audience is the reason for a speech event. In Chapter 3, we presented a model that
provides an overview of the entire process of speech preparation and delivery; the
model is shown again in Figure 6.1. We reemphasize here the concept of public
speaking as an audience-centered activity that we stress in those chapters: At each
stage in crafting your speech, you must be mindful of your audience.

6 .1

Figure 6.1 Audience analysis is central to the speechmaking

process.

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CONSIDER

THE

AUDIENCE

Deliver

Speech

Generate

Main

Ideas

Develop

Central

Idea

Gather

Supporting

Material

Select

and Narrow

Topic

Rehearse

Speech

Determine

Purpose

Organize

Speech