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14.9: Constructing Visual Aids

  • Page ID
    18618
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    The more varied the listeners’ cultural backgrounds, the more important it is for speakers to use visual materials to illustrate their ideas. Well- chosen visual aids are especially useful to help address language differences (Gamble & Gamble, 1998; Jaffe, 2004). However, interculturally competent public speakers are sensitive to the diverse sensibilities of their audience and choose visual aids that would likely be most effective with their audience. Research on intercultural website design has shown that low context cultures prefer more text heavy websites that state ideas explicitly and directly and follow a more consistent color scheme and structure. On the other hand, high context cultures prefer visually heavy websites that state ideas intuitively and indirectly and follow a more diverse color scheme and structure (Usunier & Roulin, 2010; Wurtz, 2005). Borrowing from this literature, public speakers could choose between literal, direct visual aids that follow a consistent color scheme and structure; or more subtle, abstract ones that employ more diversity in colors and structure, depending on whether the audience hails from low- or high-context cultures.

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    Further, color holds additional significance in different cultural contexts. For instance, a professor of Dutch origin was lecturing to a group of students in Singapore. She was happy that she had inserted a slide at the end of her presentation wishing the students "Gong Xi Fa Cai" (Happy Chinese New Year). However, she was greeted with frozen faces instead of friendly smiles. Later, a student enlightened her that instead of using red, which is seen as an auspicious color, she had used a black background. which is seen as inauspicious!


    This page titled 14.9: Constructing Visual Aids is shared under a CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by Ganga S. Dhanesh@National University of Singapore (Public Speaking Project) via source content that was edited to the style and standards of the LibreTexts platform; a detailed edit history is available upon request.