{"id":53,"date":"2020-07-13T16:24:06","date_gmt":"2020-07-13T16:24:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-publicspeaking\/?post_type=chapter&p=53"},"modified":"2022-07-26T16:21:55","modified_gmt":"2022-07-26T16:21:55","slug":"speaking-as-civic-engagement","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-publicspeaking\/chapter\/speaking-as-civic-engagement\/","title":{"raw":"Speaking as Civic Engagement","rendered":"Speaking as Civic Engagement"},"content":{"raw":"
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Learning Objectives<\/h3>\r\nOutline public speaking as a form of advocacy or civic engagement.\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\nThe very foundation of public speaking is rooted in advocacy and civic engagement.\u00a0 Aristotle framed public speaking, or rhetoric as it was called at the time, as the art of persuasion and said the early study of it would lead a rhetorician to discover all means of persuasion within a given case. So important was rhetoric that it became a discipline of study necessary to take part in the civil society of Athenian Greece.\r\n\r\nToday\u2019s form of civic engagement involves seeking out and creating opportunities to listen as well as to be heard, whether speaking at your local city counsel meeting, PTA, or even in front of Congress.\r\n\r\n\"A\r\n\r\nWhen we learn to speak up and speak out, we increase our\u00a0civic agency<\/strong>, which can be defined as the capacity of members of a society \"to work collaboratively across differences like partisan ideology, faith traditions, income, geography and ethnicity to address common challenges, solve problems and create common ground.\"[footnote]Civic Agency<\/i>. American Association of State Colleges and Universities, www.aascu.org\/programs\/adp\/civicagency\/.[\/footnote] According to political theorist Danielle Allen, civic agency entails three core tasks:\r\n

First is disinterested deliberation<\/strong> around a public problem. Here the model derives from Athenian citizens gathered in the assembly, the town halls of colonial New Hampshire, and public representatives behaving reasonably in the halls of a legislature. Second is prophetic work<\/strong> intended to shift a society\u2019s values; in the public opinion and communications literature, this is now called \u201cframe shifting.\u201d\u00a0<\/sup>Think of the rhetorical power of nineteenth-century abolitionist Harriet Beecher Stowe, of Martin Luther King, Jr., or of Occupy Wall Street activists with their rallying cry of \u201cwe are the 99 percent.\u201d Finally, there is transparently interested \u201cfair fighting<\/strong>,\u201d where a given public actor adopts a cause and pursues it passionately. One might think of early women\u2019s rights activists such as Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage.[footnote]Allen, Danielle. \u201cWhat Is Education For?\u201d Boston Review<\/i>, 24 Oct. 2016, bostonreview.net\/forum\/danielle-allen-what-education.[\/footnote]<\/p>\r\nAllen organizes the three elements of civic agency along a continuum of interest\u2014the degree to which one is personally invested in or affected by a given issue. When I attend a meeting about improving traffic flow in my city, I may be doing so from a fairly disinterested<\/em> standpoint. Regardless of my feelings about traffic, I don't have any greater or lesser personal stake in it than anyone else. However, if the issue under discussion is whether to knock down my apartment building to put in a new freeway, I might have a more\u00a0interested <\/em>view of the subject, and I might advocate<\/strong>\u00a0a different solution, such as improved public transportation. This public advocacy is what Allen calls the civic task of \"fair fighting\": speaking up for a cause.\r\n\r\nWhen we ask an audience to consider our ideas, take action, find solutions, or support a policy, we are advocating<\/strong>. Most importantly, advocacy demands that you identify what you hope to accomplish. Wanting change is where advocacy begins, but it requires that we identify the specific changes that we are advocating for. Otherwise, we cannot prescribe behavioral calls to action.\r\n\r\nCivic engagement demands that we move beyond our social circles to consider what an oppositional or undecided audience believes, feels, and values. A skilled public speaker then shapes arguments and uses examples and support that will resonate with that audience to deliver a powerful, well-executed, and meaningful speech.\r\n

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To Watch<\/h3>\r\nIn May of 1969, Fred Rogers spoke before the US Subcommittee on Communication to advocate against cutting the PBS budget in half. Committee Chair Sen. John O. Pastore, who was initially adversarial and dismissive toward Rogers, responded to his speech by saying, \u201cI think it\u2019s wonderful. Looks like you just earned the $20 million.\u201d\r\n\r\n