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Essential Elements of Public Speaking, 7th edition

Published by Pearson (May 5, 2020) © 2021

  • Joseph A. DeVito Hunter College of the City University of New York

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For courses in public speaking.

A clear, step-by-step guide to public speaking

Essential Elements of Public Speaking helps students master the skills they need to speak informatively and persuasively. Author Joseph DeVito breaks the process of public speaking into 10 discrete steps in order to give students everything they need to learn how to prepare and present successful speeches. In addition to speaking to inform and to persuade, the text also highlights how to speak effectively in a group, as well as how to deliver successful speeches on special occasions such as weddings.

The 7th Edition has been updated throughout with new examples, exercises and topic discussions.

Hallmark features of this title

  • The 10 Steps to Public Speaking system guide students in the preparation and presentation of a public speech, breaking the process into discrete, manageable steps that are addressed in detail throughout the book.
  • Learning Objectives guide students to focus on the major concepts of the chapter.
  • Public Speaking Exercises at the end of each chapter prompt students to engage actively with the concepts discussed in the text.
  • In-Preview Diagrams throughout the text provide quick visuals of the content to follow, making it easier for students to get an overview before reading the specifics.
  • Self-Tests at various points throughout the text keep students engaged and personalize the material. These tests focus on a wide variety of public speaking issues.

New and updated features of this title

Foster engagement and critical thinking

  • UPDATED: Ethical Choice Point boxes in each chapter describe situations that raise ethical issues, and ask students how they should react. By the end of the text, students should have formulated a clear and defensible ethical standard to govern their own public speaking.
  • UPDATED: Public Speaking Choice Points present brief scenarios in which a decision must be made, and prompt students to identify and evaluate the available choices in terms of their predicted outcomes.
  • UPDATED: Viewpoints photo captions prompt readers to consider a variety of public speaking issues, many of which focus on social media, the workplace and culture.

Refreshed content keeps the text up to date

  • NEW: Chapter 1 includes an expanded discussion of ethics as well as additional coverage of the nature of apprehension, including the factors that cause apprehension.
  • NEW: A major section on the universals of audiences in Chapter 4 highlights those characteristics that all audiences have in common and that a speaker needs to understand.
  • NEW: Chapter 9 has been updated with a discussion of abstraction, expanded coverage of sentence construction and a more thorough discussion of cultural sensitivity and cultural identifiers.

Features of Revel for the 7th Edition

  • In-line audio examples of effective and ineffective speaking approaches are enhanced with audio demonstrations. This adds dimension and reinforces learning in a way that a printed text cannot.
  • The Public Speaking Sample Assistants include outlines and full speeches annotated by the author to highlight how the concepts in the text have been effectively applied.

PART I. FUNDAMENTALS OF PUBLIC SPEAKING
1. Introducing Public Speaking
2. Listening and Criticism

PART II. PREPARING AND PRESENTING PUBLIC SPEECHES
3. Select Your Topic, Purposes, and Thesis (Step 1)
4. Analyze Your Audience (Step 2)
5. Research Your Speech (Step 3)
6. Collect Supporting Materials (Step 4)
7. Use Presentation Aids (Step 4, continued)
8. Organize Your Speech (Steps 5, 6, and 7)
9. Word and Rehearse Your Speech (Steps 8 and 9)
10. Present Your Speech (Step 10)

PART III. TYPES OF SPEECHES
11. Speaking to Inform
12. Speaking to Persuade
13. Speaking on Special Occasions
14. Speaking in Groups

About our authors

Joseph A. DeVito received his BA from Hunter College, his MA from Temple University and his PhD from the University of Illinois. After earning his doctorate in speech and linguistics, DeVito returned to teach in the CUNY system, first at his alma mater, Hunter College, and then at Queens College. During his teaching career, DeVito taught a wide variety of undergraduate and graduate courses with a focus on introductory courses. He is currently Professor Emeritus at Hunter College.

At various times, DeVito has served on the editorial boards of Quarterly Journal of Speech, Communication Monographs, Communication Education, Communication Quarterly, Journal of Communication and Etc: A Review of General Semantics. He has also served as a consulting editor to the following publishers: Random House, Harper & Row, Waveland Press and HarperCollins. He was an ETS coordinator of the committee to construct the DANTES Public Speaking Test for the Educational Testing Service as well. A prolific author, DeVito has written or edited more than 30 books in the field of communication, including The Interpersonal Communication Book, Human Communication: The Basic Course, Essential Elements of Public Speaking, Interpersonal Messages and Essentials of Human Communication, all published by Pearson. A number of his textbooks have been translated into a variety of languages including Mandarin Chinese, Indonesian, French, Greek and Czech.

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