Course Objectives
Many commentators have identified Barack Obama as an effective and
inspiring speaker. They have identified his speaking as one of Obama's
primary assets as a political and cultural leader. We are going to test
that thesis this semester. But we will go beyond mere test to ask: What
defines effectiveness and inspiration in speaking?
When you enrolled, this course had two concepts built into its title:
special topics and seminar. Why special topic? Well, the course differs
from any other in the Department of Communication because it focuses
on only one speaker. I hope that this focus will allow us to see the
many dimensions of speaking that come together in any speaker. We can
see Obama in many different situations and using many different strategies
to appreciate a little more the possibilities and limitations of his
speaking abilities and the many demands made on a leader who is a speaker.
Why seminar? The word denotes that much of the work of analyzing the
subject matter of the course rests with the students. They are expected
to generate hypotheses to understand the subject matter and the instructor
is to provide guidance. Thus, a seminar is different than a lecture
course. Many of the courses I teach are hybrids, part lecture and part
discussion. My hope is that I will not lecture this semester. You will
enter discussion freely and voluminously and we will work with your
insights. I will try to provide you some readings to inform those insights,
but I will depend a lot on you. A seminar of 35 is going to be very
difficult to pull off. How often will you get to speak? But I hope you
will aggressively offer your insights and we will worry about traffic
jams as we go along.
A couple comments on attitude. In our polarized political world we
sometimes take a Manichean view of our leaders: they are either good
or bad. I hope your and my treatment of Obama will be more textured
than that. This course is designed neither to praise nor condemn Obama's
speaking. I hope that we will acknowledge his strengths when we find
them, but will also offer commentary on his failures when we identify
them. Try to leave your Manichean biases aside and free yourself to
see strengths and weaknesses. Our goal should not be balance, however,
but reasoned judgment. If the theses are right about Obama's abilities
as a speaker, the overall weight will be positive in the course. But
we want to be open to criticisms as well as praise, and be ready to
defend judgments that each of us makes.
This attitude of openness should carry into our classroom discussion.
Respect each other's judgments. Respect certainly means that we can
and should challenge those judgments. So, don't take someone disagreeing
with you as a sign of a position on Obama. When you forward a judgment
frame it in the language that you are learning that allows you to talk
about Obama's speaking as a practical art linked to cultural and political
leadership.
There is a second danger we want to guard against. There is a tendency
when we look intently at speaking to perform an autopsy. An autopsy
is lifeless. The corpse has been carved up but all that is left is the
memory of life, not the life itself. We must make certain as we apply
our ways of understanding Obama's speaking that we do not lose what
gives those speeches their quality that has inspired so many. Don't
be afraid to be inspired. Sense your response and seek to explain it.
So, I hope you enjoy the semester looking at the speaking of a leader
who has inspired many, and irritated many as well. What can we learn
about him, about leadership, about rhetoric, through the study of his
speeches.
Who is the course for?
I think there are actually two kinds of students for whom this will
be an interesting course. One kind admires Obama and wants to understand
more about the qualities of leadership that they see in him that leaves
them inspired. I believe such faith in leadership can survive the process
of more detailed understanding that I hope is the result of our study.
But the other type of student is the student of leadership and/or rhetoric
who sees Obama as an interesting exemplar of one or the other or both.
For them, this course is a case study in a speaker that can tell us
much about how the many aspects of speaking come together in someone
for whom speaking is the center of their profession.
Who is the course not for? Well, I will assume if you hate politics
and you hate thinking about current events you would not be here. If
I am wrong, drop fast. This course is about politics and current events
and you will be immersed in them.
But I would also point to the method of the course. There are some
habits of studenting that you should be comfortable with, or seek an
alternative course. I defined seminar above. This course more than most
requires your active participation in discussion. If you are more comfortable
with soaking up knowledge as a sponge, this may not be the course for
you. There will be less structure than you may be used to in courses.
Remember! It is a seminar.
And, finally, as the section below on attendance indicates, if you
have a hard time making it to class every time, you will have a very
difficult time succeeding academically in this course. Look for another
more attuned to your style of studenting.
What knowledge should you have before you come into this course?
Very little in my mind. I acknowledge that those who have had a course
such as COMM 401, COMM 460, or COMM 461 where the premium is on analysis
of discourse will probably pick up the approach sooner than those who
have not had these courses. But I think that you will pick it up early
enough. Feel free to discuss any early feelings of inadequacy with me.
Some knowledge of politics will also be useful. Most of the history
we will be talking about here is within the last three years, so you
have lived it. If you did so with awareness and interest, you should
be fine in this regard. If you hate politics and ignore the news and
current events, then, as I indicated above, drop. It is going to be
drudgery.
What will the course be like?
As I have indicated, I hope this will be primarily a discussion course.
You will be expected to do some preparation before each class meeting.
This will involve reading and/or viewing material that will form the
basis of our discussion. Before each class I will ask you to process
what you have read or viewed into discussion points. Those will then
serve as the basis of our in-class work.
I can go at this another direction that may help you get oriented.
The semester will divide in two parts. In the first part we will look
together at many of Obama's most important speeches. I will lead these
discussions, but you are the discussants. These sessions should hone
your skills as analysts of discourse. Then in the second part of the
semester, seven groups will lead the class in looking at speeches they
select from Obama's time as president. We will then end the semester
by summarizing what we have discovered about Obama the speaker.
Learning Resources
This course does not have a textbook in the traditional sense. You
will have two kinds of materials. First, you will have some material
that is about speakers, speaking, and rhetorical theory. The discussions
during the application section of the course will sometimes require
your reading articles posted on ELMS. These will provide some perspectives
that we can apply to our subject: Obama's speaking. You should read
these to formulate ideas for questions that we might ask about his speaking.
These vary a great deal in sophistication. Some may be tough for you
to read. But hopefully our discussion will help make them fully accessible.
The other artifacts we will work with are Obama speeches. Obviously
you do not just read these for ideas. You view them as performances
that you will study to make cogent comments about their quality and
qualities. You will go over these several times, no doubt, and will
formulate claims from your study. We have them all in video format as
well as text. You will work with both. The only limitation we must overcome
is that they are read out of the context of their delivery. Your task
will be to put them back into that context.
I am not a great fan of ELMS. I have been using websites in my teaching
for well over a decade, but ELMS seems to crash too often and some of
its restrictions on the things one can do are silly. But it does have
some advantages in terms of collaboration and ongoing communication.
Since this course is about things happening every day I think we can
take advantage of some of these as learning resources. For example,
I have established a class blog (not to be confused with your journals).
Here I will post some things that I see in papers and on line that I
think are relevant to our learning. I hope you will do the same. When
you make entries write a short (paragraph or two) text to put the piece
into context for us. You may also comment on anything that you want
to see if others are perceiving. This is our class blog. We will see
if this is useful. I don't expect you to consult this every day or on
an ongoing basis, but let's see how useful it is.
