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Introduction to Speech Communication (CMN 1310/1390)

This page is a way to deliver important information regarding Public Speaking to the EIU and Charleston community. Please see the navigation bar to the right for news, announcements, upcoming speakers on campus, useful links, and public speaking resources. Also make sure to check out our YouTube page and follow us on Twitter

Current 1310/1390 students click here to complete the Spring 2013 Post-Assessment Survey

April 2013

Quote of the Month

Sam Fuller was a notable WWI veteran and fiction filmmaker who once said:

“Surviving is the only glory in war.” 

Tip of the Month

Using the metaphor of war to think about a semester can be healthy if done right. Your teacher is your commander, they give orders, and then you execute them. Your living space is the war room, your planner and syllabus provide the maps and operation plans, and your brain houses the mission objectives and hopefully the intelligence. Of course, this semester is not a real war, but it is a fight. Don’t give up because the fight is almost over. If you do well, you’ll be in for a promotion and maybe some personal citations. If you’ve what you are supposed to, you will survive the war. If you survive enough semesters, you will graduate. 

Speech of the Month

The context of Slim Pickens’ speech is highly imaginative and delivered in highly imaginative context. Slim Pickens commands a group of bomber planes flying over Russia is a hypothetical doomsday scenario. The film, Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, is a satire on the seriousness of the Cold War climate that evolved that evolved directly after WWII and into 1989. Slim provides a motivational speech to his fellow wingmen about getting the job done and done right. It is clear he has lost some sense of why he’s doing what he’s doing but knows that he has to finish. At certain points of the semester, you made lose focus or even question why you’re doing what you’re doing. Stick it out because it will all be worth it in the end. Things may be intense now, but think about how good it will feel when it's over and summer is here.