Public Addresses

Definition:  A speech, or talk, given to a wide audience in a public setting. A dispense of information and rhetoric, given through a speaker to an established crowd and audience.

Example from a Protest Movement: 

Martin Luther King's "I have a dream," speech would be considered a public address.  It is a public speech delivered during the March on Washington in 1963. He delivered the speech to over 250,000 civil right supports and the speech has gone down in history as a defining moment of the American Civil Rights Movement.

Passage From the Text:

"The recommendation has been made, for example, that we pay somewhat less attention to the single speaker and more to speakers- that we turn our attention from the individual 'great orator' and undertake research into such selected acts and atmospheres of public address as would permit the study of a multiplicity of speakers...". (10)

"... The critic must judge the discourse (the public address) in terms of theories of rhetoric and public opinions indigenous to the times". (12)

Griffin talks about public addresses and how they must be judged. And how a broader study of speakers and their atmosphere can lead to a greater understanding of public address and discourse.

Works Cited:
Griffin, Leland M. "The Rhetoric of Historical Movements." Readings in the Rhetoric of Social Protest. Browne, Stephen Howard, and Charles E. Morris III, eds. State College, PA: Strata Publishing, Inc., 2013.