Kevin Costner's at Whitney Houstons Public Memorial - Speech or Presentation Example

Journalism, Mass Media and Communication Speech Evaluation (Kevin Costner at Whitney Houston’s Public Memorial) Introduction During Whitney Houston’s Public Memorial at the New Hope Baptist Church in New Jersey, Kevin Costner, a renowned actor, was among the people who gave speeches. The actor and producer for Whitney’s first movie gave one of the most moving speeches shocking the audience of the strong relationship between Whitney and Costner. Kevin Costner’s aim was sharing the stories and experiences they had and showing the audience his perspective about Whitney, her career and source of inspiration for many people around the globe. The speech went on for 15 minutes and Kevin Costner relayed his views to a quiet and attentive audience. Relative to ‘The Bodyguard’ movie, Kevin narrates his persistence for Houston playing the lead part and how he helped Whitney overcome the peers and negative pressure from many people who believed she did not fit the role (American Rhetoric, 1). Whitney’s doubt facilitated the strong relationship between her and Costner, who encouraged her to stay strong and relaxed. The speech was emotional for Costner and the audience as shown by several pauses where he tried to control his emotions. Kevin Costner extensively expresses his admiration of Whitney’s humility, especially when performing or acting and this is what made her great, famous and whom she was. Generally, the speech focuses on the relationship between Whitney and Costner, their similarities, happy times and attributes most of the audience did not know about her. Kevin Costner, ending remarks were “So off you go, Whitney. Off you go,” he said, “escorted by an army of angels, to your heavenly father. And when you sing before him, don’t you worry, you’ll be good enough.” (American Rhetoric, 1) Language Kevin Costner choice of words and tone in his speech is the key contributor to its emotional impact on the audience. At the beginning of his speech, Costner thanks the audience, Cissy and Dionne Houston for their reception using the word ‘gracefully’ (American Rhetoric, 1). The appreciation makes the audience feel honored attracting the interest to the rest of Costner’s Speech. In addition, Costner says he wanted to tell the audience about his times with Whitney in form of stories, which he wrote down to avoid forgetting. This displays his honesty and simultaneously earns him the trust of the audience making it easy for them to relate to his situations and experiences all the way to the end remarks of his speech. As part of Costner’s spoken language, he applied discrete speech sounds to replete his identity, the gravity of the matter and his emotional state as among the most affected people by Whitney’s demise. This technique in his language extensively affected his speech making it easy for the audience to identify the sound. Moreover, the vocal properties most affected by his emotion directly related to the words facilitating the establishment of speech rate and pitch changes by the audience. The largest part of Costner’s speech was a depiction of emotive language appealing to the audience’s emotions instead of their personal relations and perceptions of Whitney Houston as family, friend, colleague or famous singer. Costner took total control of the audience’s beliefs and thoughts through the emotive language creating empathy. However, the empathy was more prevalent on him as shown by the frequent pauses in his speech. During the early stages of his speech, Costner posed a number of rhetorical questions to his audience such as ‘What am I talking about, really? This as part of his language facilitated the extensive engagement of the audience. Typically, Costner also established balance in his speech through phrases and sentences that appealed to the audience, individually and collectively i.e. your mother and I had a lot in common or I urge as all, inside and outside, across the nation and around the world to dry our tears and suspend our sorrow (American Rhetoric, 1). Body Language Kevin Costner, given his career as an actor, used a lot of body language, which partially contributed to keeping the audience attentive and conveying his moving speech. Costner observed the Neutral, Open, Defined and Strong (NODS) principle of effective public speaking. Most of the time, when looking at the written material, Costner stood in a neutral position resting his arms on the lectern. He was open to the audience, who could easily identify his emotions not only through voice but also through minimal movements of his hands and head. The sparingly use of gestures kept his speech defined, especially with the timely and limited movements at the beginning, which became strong as the speech progressed. Costner’s upper body was firm hence could support his movement and amplify his words to the audience. Given the stature of the speech, Costner refrained from moving to the right or left as a way of maintain his calm and avoiding to breakdown before finishing the speech. However, he did not allow the emotions to affect his posture and his comfort as he stood at the dais. The ease and firm posture demonstrated Costner’s confidence and position of being the better person to give a speech about Whitney. Additionally, it gave the audience confidence of believing in his stories and experiences with Whitney. He did not overdo the speech making his emotions appear real and true. Costner’s facial expressions, throughout the speech created an incredible human experience through recognition of people in the audience and comprehending the delicate evidences as key aspects of his motive (American Rhetoric, 1). The facial expressions were the core reflections of the emotions of the audience since anyone looking at Costner would understand Whitney meant a lot to him. The verbal and facial expressions of Costner worked together to making the speech meaningful and perfect for the event as a public memorial for Whitney Houston. Voice Naturally, the voice and body language coincide as contributors to the physical influences for public speaking. Kevin Costner, even while filled with emotion, used his voice as the most supple communication implement that exists. He kept total control of his voice throughout the speech and times when the emotions would appear to overcome him; he would pause for a while to reclaim his strength. Costner’s voice was the key influence of the emotional audience; his substantial vocal expressiveness did at all, particularly conveying the meaning and intention of his speech (American Rhetoric, 1). Not only did he find his true voice but also made every effort to maintain it hence everyone outside and inside the church would hear and understand every word. Definitely, there are times when Costner would speak to fast to overcome his emotions or avoid choking because he was not breathing often enough. However, he would immediately notice it and slow down his speaking with the breath, pause and take a breath before continuing. This contributed to the fluency of his speech helping maintain the audience’s attention. Moreover, to avoid a repetition of this Costner would stop and breathe between stories by constantly inhaling and exhaling deeply before going on to the next story. Relatively, other times Costner would appear to speak too slowly mainly because of choking and not using enough air. The emotions made a few words sound dull but like in the speaking too fast situations, he would use up enough air by changing his posture, helping move his abdominal muscles and seen in the ways he would breath (American Rhetoric, 1). Deeper breathes affected the sound of his voice making it clear and more energetic despite the intense emotions in the atmosphere at the time. Attracting the Attention of the Audience Kevin Costner did not only attract the attention of audience but also kept them attentive throughout his speech. Firstly, he started with the unexpected by saying ‘The song "I Will Always Love You" almost wasn’t. It wasn’t supposed to be in the movie’. This attracted the attention of everyone since the song was one of Whitney Houston’s most popular hits. This was surprising for the audience making everyone eager to know what else Costner had to say. After acquiring the audience’s attention with his compelling opening, Costner made the following part of his speech about them by asking them to suspend their sorrow after which he asked a few humorous and rhetoric questions (American Rhetoric, 1). This made the audience drift away from their emotions for a minute and simultaneously made them more interested in Costner’s stories about Whitney. The comparison of himself and Whitney Houston definitely got everyone wondering and he did not give the similar attributes straightaway. In fact, he assumed his position as that of the audience’s by pointing out the obvious discrepancies between the two. This made everyone, including Cissy and Bobbi Kristina laugh. The entertaining and relaxing apprehensions formed the basis of Costner’s influence and speech technique and definitely helped in keeping the audience attentive. The statement pointing out Whitney’s song could not exist acted as a felt need towards the audience making the put significant attention towards Costner’s speech. The stories and persistence in keeping audience attention were the main facilitators of Costner’s connection with the audience hence people could assert that his speech was moving and emotional. Works Cited American Rhetoric. Kevin Costner Address at the Public Memorial for Whitney Houston: Online Speech Bank, February 18, 2012. Web, April 27, 2015 Read More