Voice is an important aspect of communication.
According to the authors of Communication
A Critical/Cultural Introduction,
“how you share your ideas with a given group is shaped by how you think you can
impress those ideas.” You have to judge the audience and chose the correct tone
of voice. To be a good communicator you have to evaluate the best way to get your
purpose across to the audience. When I was a coach for youth wrestling it was
hard to get all the rowdy kids to listen to me. I would have to use a strong
loud voice for them to listen to me. They needed to know who was the boss in
the wrestling room and that I was the authoritative figure in the room. Using
an authoritative tone of voice was the best way to get my audience to listen to
what I was trying to say. But if my audience was my elderly grandparents I wouldn’t
be using an authoritative tone of voice anymore. I would choose a much gentler
and kinder tone because that is a more appropriate tone of voice to have them
listen to me. A lot of times that people aren’t effective communicators or
people don’t listen to them is because they don’t use the right tone of voice.
When you want to be heard, you have to be loud. When you want to make peace
with someone you need to be gentler and calmer.
There are
some public speakers in our history that are known for the voices. Martin
Luther King Jr. was a man who speeches made everyone fight for what they
believed in. He is known for his voice as being this loud booming voice. But
when he spoke he brought peace also. He spoke loud but he also had this tone to
him that was peaceful. In a website I found called Business Know How, it talks
about how Martin had emotion in his tone of voice. His audience really felt he
cared about what he was talking about and was invested into what he was saying.
I think this is important because he was able to connect to his audience by
using emotion during a time that was filled with emotion. Ronald Reagan is
another example of a great public speaker who used the correct tone of voice to
get the attention of his audience. He was known for being a loud powerful
speaker but also he also knew what tone of voice to use for his audience. In
New York Daily News they talk about how Ronald Reagan kept his speeches simple.
He didn’t have this arrogant voice. He spoke to his audience about issues in a
normal simple tone of voice. That is why so many people thought he was such an
effective communicator. He didn’t try to sound smart and use terms people had
no idea about. He spoke in a way that regular people would understand.
Tone of voice is one of the most
important things when delivering in communication. Your audience can range from
a five-year-old kid to an eighty-year-old grandma. You have to know the tone of
voice that is going to be the most efficient to get your point across. Without
the correct tone of voice there is a high chance your audience won’t listen to
you and won’t be able to connect with you. That is why Martin Luther King Jr.
and Ronald Reagan are some of the best known communicators in history. They were
able to identify the tone of voice needed to connect with their audience and to
get their point across. It’s a skill that makes us effective communicators and
is important in the process of communication.
Warren, J. T., & Fassett, D. L.
(2011). Communication: A critical/cultural introduction. Thousand Oaks, CA:
SAGE Publications.
The Courage to Live Consciously -
Steve Pavlina. (2015). Retrieved September 30, 2016, from http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2004/10/the-courage-to-live-consciously/
Thompson, F. (2011). Thompson: Why
Reagan was the Great Communicator. Retrieved September 30, 2016, from
http://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/made-ronald-reagan-great-communicator-u-s-senator-fred-thompson-reflects-article-1.133489
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