On October 4, 2016, a famous astronaut Marsha Sue Ivins gave a speech on her experience in space traveling as part of the lecture for the World Space Week. She shared her knowledge about the space exploration and provided the audience with ideas of further plans regarding the exploration and colonization of other planets. The students, senior staff, and AUS alumnus took part in the lecture. Amer Al Sayegh also gave a speech and introduced the guest speaker to the audience. It should be stated that Mr. Amer Al Sayegh gave rather a long speech and read from the paper, which created an impression that he was not aware of the information he had to present meanwhile Ms. Marsha Ivins was very persuasive and used a variety of visual aids to support the audience’s comprehension.
It should be noted that the guest speaker, Ms. Ivins, stressed out that the government should allocate resources to conduct further space explorations and travels. According to Ms. Ivins, at present, no sufficient equipment that would allow people to travel and settle further than the Moon is available. In addition, the speaker explained that the colonization of Mars that is being vividly discussed is impossible at this stage of the development of the space sector and poor availability of resources allocated to the industry. The objective of the speech was to acquaint the listeners with practices accepted during space traveling and common experiences that may not be known to the general public.
It is worth mentioning that Ms. Ivins is an experienced lecturer and astronaut; consequently, it was evident that she would be able to share her experience and expertise with the listeners freely (“The History of Human Space Flight” par. 2). In contrast, Mr. Amer Al Sayegh relied on the paper materials all the time so as not to forget what he needed to tell further. It was also difficult to understand the meaning of his speech and the core ideas as he made big breaks between the sentences and, in general, procrastinated his speech (Eelen 101). However, Ms. Ivins used the time as efficiently as possible and took into account the specifics of the audience (Donovan and Avery 9). She shared her personal experiences and impressions in detail. Moreover, it was easy to understand the purpose of her speech as the visual materials such as extracts of text and pictures supported it (Rosenberg 16). To boost her speech, Ms. Ivins provided factual information and data and defined the terms that were not known to the audience. Overall, the speech was enjoyable and informative because the speaker changed the mood from serious to humorous to release the possible tension and avoid the distraction of the listeners (Schmid 111). It should be noted that is rather difficult to disagree with the speaker about the points she provided as not that many people have such a rich experience in space traveling like Ms. Ivins does (Cox 14). However, the facts that she provided convince in the reliability and validity of her statements.
In conclusion, the lecture was indeed informative, and the guest speaker was able to acquaint the audience with the main issues of space traveling practices. The contrast between the two main participants allows stating that Ms. Ivins was successful in conducting an effective presentation. She was able to achieve the aims of her statements and kept the audience interested in the content of her speech.
Works Cited
Cox, Ronald. Schutz’s Theory of Relevance, New York: Springer Science & Business Media, 2012. Print.
Donovan, Jeremey, and Ryan Avery. Speaker, Leader, Champion, Pennsylvania: McGraw Hill Professional, 2014. Print.
Eelen, Gino. A Critique of Politeness Theory, New York: Routledge, 2014. Print.
Rosenberg, Jay. Linguistic Representation, New York: Springer Science & Business Media, 2012. Print.
Schmid, Ulla. Moore’s Paradox, New York: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG, 2014. Print.
The History of Human Space Flight 2016. Web.