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Chapter 10 of Oral Presentations for
Technical Communication examines presentations
designed to persuade or convince an audience.
Persuasive presentations take many forms, from
overtly persuasive to presentations that present
various sides of an issue. In this chapter you will
study the following:
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What are Persuasive Presentations?
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Types of Persuasive Presentations in
Technical Communication
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Tips for Creating Effective Persuasive
Presentations
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Preparing Your First Persuasive
Presentation
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These exercises build on the ideas addressed
in Chapter 10:
1.Pay attention to persuasive discourse in every
day life -- television commercials, newspaper
editorials, Web pages, oral presentations,
political speeches. Listen for the hidden major
premise--what assumptions is the writer or speaker
making about the audience's values? Is the premise
always appropriate for a given audience? Also, pay
attention to any logical fallacies in the
argument.
2. Select a persuasive presentation topic and
consider it for two different audiences. Assume the
first audience is generally in favor of your
overall idea but has not heard the specifics.
Assume the second audience is generally opposed to
your idea and has also not heard any specific
details. Outline your presentation for each
audience. Decide what form of organization the body
of the presentation should take in each case.
Presentations and Cyberspace. Locate a
Web site (in a scientific or technical field) that
interests you and that seems intended to persuade
site visitors to believe something or take a
specific action (if you have difficulty locating a
site, skim journals and technology sections in
local and national newspapers, or ask a professor
or graduate student in your major). Identify the
persuasive purpose and the audience of the site,
and analyze it based on the tips you studied in
this chapter. Examine the construction of the
argument, the use of evidence, the use of appeals,
the approach to counter arguments, the level of
professionalism, and the use of visual elements. Do
you find any logical fallacies? If so, identify the
fallacy and explain why it is a problem. Does the
site achieve the intended purpose? Why or why not?
Plan how you would revise the site to increase its
effectiveness as a persuasive site. Discuss your
analysis with your class and solicit their comments
about the site and your perspective on it. If
appropriate, contact the Web Master for the site
(contact information should be located at the site)
and share your analysis.
Presentation and Teamwork. Persuasive
presentations can be given individually or as part
of a team. Sometimes, the entire team may give the
presentation, while other times team members share
the research and design of the presentation and
elect one member to give the presentation itself.
Form a team of 2-3 people from your class based on
a persuasive topic that is of interest to all team
members. Assign each member a specific set of
research tasks. Work as a group to design the
presentation, and decide which team member should
deliver the presentation. Remember that you still
must perform an audience and purpose analysis,
paying special attention to the counter arguments
of your audience. As you work on your group
presentation, keep track of group interaction. What
process did you use to assign the research tasks?
How did you select one person to deliver the
presentation itself? What items do you agree should
go into the persuasive presentation, and what items
is there disagreement on? When you prepare a
persuasive presentation with a team, you ultimately
may learn more about the topic and the various
points of view on the subject matter than you might
learn on your own.
Presentations and International
Communication. Listen to the radio, CSPAN,
CNN, and other
sources for speeches that individuals from other
cultures give in their native countries (usually
given in their native language but translated into
English for broadcast purposes). Listen also to
some speeches by these or similar individuals given
in the United States. How did the organizational
style of these speeches differ? What do these
differences tell you about the cultural
expectations of the other culture? What do they
tell you about how that culture views American
culture? How can this analysis help you prepare for
a presentation that you will give to members of
that other culture?
Presentations and Your Profession.
Interview someone in your profession or in the
career you are preparing for when you graduate. Ask
them to tell you about persuasive presentations
that they have given: what topics were addressed?
How did the audience respond? In what situations
was the presenter successful in convincing the
audience, and in what situations was he or she not
successful? Outline your findings and give a brief
presentation to class.
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