The four phases of speech-meaning, words, voice, and bodily action-call for different degrees of conscious analysis. (1) Body is at first mastered with very little attention to the task, and for the most part in the first subconscious trial-and-error learning; mastery of the muscles as a prime issue in life subsides early, leaving a man fundamentally and forever the better or worse for his earliest training. (2) voice also is learned early and largely by subconscious trial and error, guided by imitation. In mastering the voice for rational speech in all its uses, however, a conscious attention creeps in. And in addition, the voice is capable of great improvement when made the subject of conscious study and practice. Further yet, such study and practice can begin early and can be of profit throughout all the years of life; and the more the voice is studied the more conscious must the study be. (3) Mastery of words, when it comes, comes late, but always involves a study that can never be exhausted. To reach mastery of language is the work of a lifetime, and for adults it must be almost wholly conscious. (4) Conscious altogether and a never-achieved task is the process of mastering meaning. For meaning is nothing less. than consciousness itself and one's very character. In the child it is feeble, fumbling, erratic; in the adult it is the man revealed his mind, his spirit, his soul. It is his awareness, his attention, his powers of perception, his interest, thought, will, his inner self-his one hold on life and the universe around him. It dominates his conscious moments; for a conscious moment at any one time is exactly what constitutes a meaning. To say that the proper study of mankind is man is to say that the proper study of mankind is man's meaning-what he is, what he represents, what other people find him to be. So, to relearn speaking, there must be a process of retracing. The inner meaning is there, but concealed by the barriers of words, voice, or body. Countless men of rich minds and wide experience find all three bars in the way. All three bars must be taken down in the order in which they offer the greatest obstruction. Students studying speech move in both directions-from within out, from without in; they daily add to their store of meanings at the same time that they are laboring to remove the bars from the path between meanings and the listener. Every step gained in control of body, voice, and language releases to the world just so much of character and knowledge, while every increment of knowledge and experience improves speech by providing body, voice, and language with more freightage to transport to those who listen. Assuming the existence of an outlet of any size to the outside world, then the greater the pressure of meaning present-character, facts, knowledge, wisdom, ambitions, and desires the greater the message the world can get by way of man's speech. One who must be reintroduced to speech training in a college class can be regarded as one who has meanings enough and mastery of words enough to work on, even when he cannot properly speak them. To acquire mastery of speech, then, his task is necessarily for the time being focused on training his voice to speak his mind with fairness and force, and on training his body so that it shall not belie his voice, words, and meaning. For the bars most commonly found obstructing meaning in the speech of college students are those of bodily action and vocal method. Among at least three-fourths of students in the mass Voice and Action lag in competence behind Words and Thought. The study of how to remove the bars in the way will not only release what is already within, but will store up new riches of knowledge, desire, and purpose. Or again, Speech is a unified process, yet it is capable of analysis, like any other unity, into a multiplicity of elements, the broadest of which are Thought, Language, Voice, and Action. These four are at once distinct and inseparable; a man speaking is a unified thing. Yet his speaking can be viewed and discussed from many different points of view, and without destroying or annulling the fundamental unity of the process. Thought depends upon Words, and Words rely upon Thought; Words need Voice for their very existence in Speech, and at the same time Voice is given its greatest possible influence through Words; while Voice in its turn is inevitably affected by bodily disposition, or Action, and Action bears a constant relation to the state of the Voice. IV. ANALYSIS OF THE PHASES OF SPEECH A working analysis of the most important factors involved in these four phases of Speech can be given in the following outline: I. Thought (a) Purpose: intention, desire, wish, will. (b) Attitudes: sets, dispositions, poses, mental postures. II. Words; Language (a) Concepts (in common with Thought). (c) Word selection: precision, clearness, accuracy, good use. (d) Words combined: into phrases, clauses, sentences -rhetoric; oral English. (e) Words made into logical and coherent discoursecomposition; speaking and reading. (f) Articulation: pronunciation; enunciation. III. Voice (a) Articulation (in common with Language). (c) Formation of vowels. (d) Breathing and vocalization. (e) Use of tone: quality, force, time, and pitch. (f) Elocution, or oral expression: general "tone," speech dynamics, rhythm, melody. (g) General attitude, set, disposition of body and vocal mechanism: emotional, intellectual disposition. IV. Action (a) General bodily attitude (in common with Voice). (b) Posture. (c) Movement. (d) Gesture: hands, arms, head, face, torso. ASSIGNMENTS 1. Learn to analyze the public and private speaking you hear into the four phases of Thought, Language, Voice, and Action. Whenever you hear speaking that impresses you as inefficient, determine in which of the phases the defect lies. 2. Study your own speech, both in ordinary conversation and in public addresses or in talks to a group or small company, to discover in what particulars you most need closer analysis and careful practice. 3. Write a report describing the conscious efforts you have made toward mastery of each of these four phases of speech. 4. What is wrong with the speaker who (a) Mumbles and is indistinct? (b) Stares at the ceiling or the floor? (c) Fumbles with papers, his coat, the pulpit covering, drinks (d) Deafens the audience with too much noise, or talks so (e) In conversation cannot look his interlocutor in the eye? (g) Cannot talk to the point, if any? (h) Gives to an audience a speech obviously a misfit for (i) Lacks fluency? (j) Uses slang and too much colloquialism? (k) Is so stiff as to cause his audience to perceive only the stiffness? (1) Makes his hearers wish he would speed up or slow down? talking about? (n) Lounges on the furniture during a public address? (0) Cannot compel his hearers to listen? (p) Seems entirely heedless of his audience? (q) Seems to be looking into the back of his own head? (r) Jerks his words out with fits and starts? (s) Is too shrill, too raucous, strident, breathless, breathy, weak? ! (t) Is awkward, ill at ease, pacing back and forth, or standing still in one place? 5. Give a talk on a familiar subject, making note of the relative significance of each of the four phases of speech; study yourself, and get criticisms from others as to your needs. Let the questions be asked: "In which is he most successful?" "In which does he most need study and practice?" Following are suggested types of subject: (a) An account of a good time: hunting trip, picnic, game, hiking excursion, trip abroad, fishing expedition. (b) Describe a familiar spot: a panorama you know, the plan of some city, a battlefield, a farm, a woods, lake, camping place. (c) Tell some exciting incident. (d) Explain the working of some machine, principle, (e) Tell of public speakers you have heard. |