Speech


 * Definition**

Lee Thayer (1987) when reflecting on the phenomenon of human communication writes that “etymologically, there is a close relationship between ‘speak’ and ‘sperm.’ They share root meanings like ‘to sprout,’ ‘to strew,’ ‘to sprinkle,’ ‘to scatter.’ So what’s the fuss about” (p. 4)? To begin with these senses of the word “speech” is to participate in a tradition with roots in Plato’s “masculinist metaphors” which align “seed = word = voice = semen = offspring” (Peters, 2006 p. 212). Nonetheless, the metaphors offer a range of meanings for understanding the phenomenon of speech.


 * Speech as Phenomenon**

The sense of speech as a phenomenon is speech as word and voice (Ong, 1967 p. 92). Therefore, to understand speech as a phenomenon we can first distinguish speech from the system of language, as articulated in Saussure (1959, p. 11) as the difference between langue and parole (also, Culler, 1976 p. 22-23), langue referring to the whole system of language, its rules, syntax, or grammar and parole referring to the “executive,” individual acts of speaking.


 * Speech as Performative Acts**

Those who would emphasize the systemic aspects of the phenomenon of speech would understood speech as comprised of discrete performative acts of speaking. Here we find Austin’s (1975, p. 12) speech act theory. Scholars influenced by this tradition typically turn to analyses of discourse. For instance, Farrell & Frentz (1979, p. 218) articulation of language-action analysis, which, when considered broadly, admits to the definition of “discourse” as “a particular form of language use (e.g. public speeches) or more generally to spoken language or ways of speaking…” (Bavelas, Kenwood, & Phillips, 2002 p. 103). One might also consider Sanders (1978, p.116), who takes Austin’s notion of performatives as a springboard for crafting a notion of utterance-as-action (pp.124-125). In these instances, a discourse researcher is interested in “who uses language, how, why, and when” (van Dijk, 1997, p. 3 cited in Bavelas, Kenwood, & Phillips, 2002). Again, speech is treated as action within rule-governed contexts. Thus such an account of the phenomenon of speech is formalistic, seeking to identify the constituent units of larger structures and how and why these smaller units are combined to form the larger structure (Jasinski, 2001, p. 170). This is the phenomenon of speech as system of language.


 * Speech as parole**

Turning to the phenomenon of speech as parole, speech is tied to sonorous, face-to-face, “voice.” To view speech as parole in further depth is to view speech as a phenomenon understood as a uniquely human attribute. Thus, Kenneth Burke (1966) definition of human beings as the “symbol-using animal” is to recognize that humanity is uniquely burdened with the capacity to respond to words/language (p.5). Tracking out “speech as phenomena” further, the ability to respond to words, i.e., “responsivity,” is also key element, as found in Mikhail Bakhtin’s (1986) account of the “utterance” in speech communication (Morson & Emerson, 1990 p. 127). Specifically, the utterance (as oppose to a grammatical sentence) is the primary unit of speech communication and is fraught with anticipation of a unique response from a unique other (Bakhtin, 1986 p. 71). When speech is understood as a phenomena we find, as in the philosophy of George Gusdorf (1953), that the very entrance into the “human” world begins with the acquisition of “speaking” and language (p. 9). To speak is to be implicated as being-in-the-world-with-others. In the existential experience of speech, moreover, language, thought, and expression are inseparable features of a single, social, sonorous event (cf. Anton, 1997 pp 185-186).


 * Speech as a Component in a Process Model**

Understanding speech as a process can be tied to Saussure’s (1959, p. 11) linguistic model as seen below: This model of speech gave way to Shannon and Weaver model of communication seen below (Berlo, 1960 p. 29): This model became a way of understanding communication as a process in the 1960’s (Berlo, 1960, p. 29, also Miller, 1972 p. 62) and became a way of understanding communication as sender, message, channel, and receiver (SMCR). Miller, (1972, p. 65) is quick to acknowledge that his model may appear to be overly linear and so stresses the importance of the concept of feedback, or “information that is fed back to its source (applause, yawning, questions, puzzled looks” (Devito, 1986, p.117) This model of communication covers over the phenomenal aspects of the experience of speech to offer a more analytical treatment of its units. Language is treated as vehicle for transmission of thought and speech is the action of expressing one’s thoughts from the interior of one person to the interior of another (cf. Heidegger, 1962 p. 209). This understanding of speech as a component in a process of communication undergirds our more common, layman’s understanding of speech in everyday life.


 * Speech as Oratory**

Speech can also be understood as a “literary genre.” Murphy (1958, pp.119-121) identifies 10 features of such speech, which resonate well with rhetorical studies of oratory. Devito (1986, p. 303) paraphrases Murphy’s defintion as:

A prose composition of varying length, fashioned for a specific or generic audience, usually but not necessarily spoken and listened to, written or recorded in some way on brain, paper, or tape for permanence, in which are interrelated author, reading or listening audience, theme, and occasion; it has ethical appeal and universality, moving force and fluency; its design is artistic, and its purposes is to direct the reader or listener to a conclusion selected by the composer.

In this sense speech is understood as “a speech,” oratory and as distinguished from literary criticism because of its oral performative (also Winchel, 1925 p. 128). Moreover in this sense we can trace this sense of speech as oratory to Aristotle as when we identifies a speech as a species of rhetoric comprised of: a speaker and a subject on which he speaks and someone addressed, and the objective telos of the speech. (Kennedy trans, 2007. p.47). Perhaps no better example of how this particular sense of speech has been utilized in the communication studies than in the study of presidential rhetoric. Indeed, by turning to speech as oratory, “a genre of public or civic discourse provides rhetorical scholars with a genre that not only is sanctioned by the ancient tradition of rhetoric but also is of tremendous social and historical significance” (Jasinski, 2001, p. xxiii). The identifying of speech as “oratory” thus contributes to a disciplinary demarcation. In fact, some scholars have expressed grief at the current trend in higher education speech communication departments to remove “speech” from their organizational disciplinary identity (Gunn, 2007, p. 363; Dance, 1989, pp. 4-5) given that oratory provides a precise treatment of a more global phenomenon that grounds what is essentially a human ethical and moral condition.

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 * References**

Anton, C. (1997) On speaking: A phenomenological recovery of a forgotten sense. //Philosophy// //and Rhetoric, 30//(2) 176-189.

Austin, J.L. (1975). //How to do things with words//. Cambridge, MA: Havard Press.

Bakhtin, M.M. (1986). //Speech genres and other essays//. Autin, TX: University of Texas Press.

Bavelas, J. Kenwood, C. & Phillips, B. (2002). Discourse analysis. In M. Knapp & J. Daly (Eds.) //Handbook of interpersonal communication//. Thousand Oaks: Sage Publishing.

Berlo, D. (1960). The process of communication. New York: Rhienholt & Wilson Press.

Burke, K. (1966). Language as symbolic action. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.

Culler, J. (1976). Ferdinand de Saussure. New York: Penguin Books.

Dance, F. E.X. (1989). Opposing a change. Spectra, (March) 4-5.

Devito, J. (1986). The communication handbook: A dictionary. New York: Harper Row.

Farrell & Frentz (1979). Communication and meaning language-action synthesis. //Philosophy// //and Rhetoric, 12//(4), 215-255.

Gusdorf, G. (1953). Speaking (La Parole). Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press.

Gunn, J. (2007). Give me some tongue (on recovering speech). //Quarterly Journal of Speech,// //93(//3), 361-364.

Heidegger, M. (1962). //Being & Time//. New York: Harper Collins.

Jasinski, J. (2001). //Sourcebook on rhetoric//. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publishing.

Murphy, R. (1958). Rhetoric as a literary genre. //Quarterly Journal of Speech, 44(//2), 117-127.

Kennedy G. (2007). //Aristotle//: //On Rhetoric// (Trans.) New York: Oxford Press.

Thayer, L. (1987). //On communication//. New Jersey: Ablex.

Miller, G. (1972). //An introduction to speech communication//. New York: Bobs Merrill.

Morson, G. & Emerson, C. (1990). //Mikhail Bakhtin: A creation of prosaics.// Standford, CA: Standford University Press.

Ong, W. J. (1967). //Literacy and Orality.// New York: Routledge.

Peters, J. D. (2006). Communication as dissemination. In G. Shepard, J. St. John, T. Striphas (Eds.) //Communication as…:Perspectives on theory.// Thousand Oaks: Sage Publishing.

Sanders, R. E. (1978). Utterances, actions, and rhetorical inquiry. //Philosophy and Rhetoric,// //11//(2), 114-133.

Saussure, F. (1959). //Course in// //general linguistics//. New York: McGraw Hill.

Winchel, H. (1925). The literary criticism of oratory. In Bryant, D. C. //The rhetorical idiom: Essays in rhetoric, oratory, language, and drama// (5-42).