Mastering Debates, Interviews, and Social Speeches
Debates: Arguments and Counterarguments
- The debate is a type of speech involving arguments and counterarguments, led by a moderator. It involves two or more parties with differing, often competing, opinions, each trying to defend their position and persuade others of its validity.
- In academia, debates often take the form of round tables within scientific meetings such as congresses, conferences, and seminars.
- In recent years, presenting a poster or participating in a panel has become another type of intervention.
- Outside academia, political debate is a widespread form, where the role of spectators is very important.
Dialogic Discourse: Job Interviews
Formal interaction between two partners:
- The interviewer, in charge of asking questions to decide on the suitability of the candidate.
- The interviewee, who responds with the intention of convincing the interviewer and showing that they are the best candidate for the job.
- Despite technological advances, most interviews are still face-to-face.
- The interviewer wants to assess, in addition to the curriculum, physical appearance, dress, manner of expression, nonverbal behavior, immediate response capacity, and knowledge of the interviewee.
Before the Interview
- It is convenient to think of questions you can ask.
- It is also convenient to prepare appropriate responses to potential questions.
Discursive Genre in the Social Field: Features
- In discursive genres, social-emotional intentionality is prevalent: expressing impressions or reactions to a specific event.
- In this kind of discourse, it is more important to convey feelings and the relevance of information.
- These speeches are often monological.
- The speaker is sometimes identified from a social standpoint.
- They are not an end in themselves but are used as aids to give prominence to an event (an opening, a retirement celebration, etc.).
- They maintain a basic speech structure: introduction, body, and conclusion. The specific structure is as follows: greeting at the ceremony, central body, acknowledgments, and final remarks.
Greeting Structure
- Greeting itself consists of three parts:
- Appellate: addressing those responsible for the speech in hierarchical order.
- Salutation.
- Thanks.
- At the ceremony: Recalling the occasion of the celebration that brings attendees together.
- Central body: The most variable part of the speech. Its content and rules depend on the type of celebration.
- Thanks and end: Concluding the intervention by thanking the audience for their attention and assistance.
- The content aims to evoke emotion in the audience.
- Unlike academic discourses, which try to avoid personal involvement, speeches in the social sphere are characterized by the speaker’s engagement with their speech. It is an ideal spot for personal anecdotes.
- This subjectivism and proximity to the audience also have potential dangers and drawbacks. Scrupulous care is needed in relationships.
- It’s important to know the audience: age, status, and geographical origin.
- It’s also important to know the context: the degree of formality (e.g., the homily at a wedding), the length of the speech, and the tone.