bbc强化听力系列--Live webcast – Politics & Language PART 1（在线收听）

Live webcast – Politics & Language 

Thursday November 23rd, 2006 

About this script 

Please note that this is not a word for word transcript of the programme as broadcast. In 

the recording process changes may have been made which will not be reflected here. 

Jackie:  Hello, this is Talk About English, live from the BBC World Service in 

London. I'm Jackie Dalton…  

Callum:  And I'm Callum Robertson. 

Jackie:  This week, in our final programme on politics and language, we hear 

about some of the tricks political speakers use to get us on their side. 

Tony Blair 

And I do it because I believe. I do it because the society I want to create is not some 

fantasy or dream. It could be true! 

Callum:  And tips for all of us on how to improve our public speaking skills.  

Sandy Miller 

It's important to be yourself. But be yourself as impactfully as you can. 

Jackie:   That's all coming up in Talk About English!  But first of all… 

Callum:  It is competition time. And you'll hear the answer to this week's question 

during the programme. And the question is: 

Jackie:  What does 'rhetoric' mean? What is 'rhetoric'? And write a sentence for 

us using the word 'rhetoric'. 

Callum:  Send your entries to [email protected] and the first correct 

entry will win. 

Jackie:  We've got extra special prizes this week! 

Callum:  Yes, not only will you get a BBC Learning English bag, but also, a 

Learning English t-shirt AND a key ring. 

Jackie:  There's a reason why we're being especially generous this week… 

Callum:  There is, and that's that this is our last webcast of 2006. We're stopping 

for a few weeks but we'll be back in 2007. 

Jackie:  And this is where you could really help us. We'd love to hear your 

feedback. We want to know how you think the webcast could be 

improved. What kinds of things would you like to see in it? Maybe you 

think it's too short or too long…What sorts of topics are you interested in? 

Callum:  Yes, send your thoughts to [email protected]. 

Jackie:  Now, as promised, let’s turn our attention to the language tricks and 

techniques that politicians use to win us over …  

Tony Blair 

We are not going to win despite our beliefs.  We will only win       

because of our beliefs!  

Callum:  The British Prime Minster Tony Blair in action …Well, to find out how 

political speeches work, we spoke to Professor Max Atkinson, an expert 

on political communication. He’s listened to hours and hours of political 

speeches in order to identify the language techniques that make an 

audience applaud.   

Jackie:  Now these techniques date back to ancient times and they’re known as 

'rhetorical devices' – from the noun ‘rhetoric’ which means the skill of 

using language effectively and to persuade. And the good news is that 

rhetorical devices are simple and easy to use! But before we listen to 

some examples, we asked Max Atkinson to explain why he thinks it’s 

important to understand the tricks of rhetoric. 

Max Atkinson  

Most people are dimly aware that, when they hear an effective communicator, that that 

person has skills that they don’t have, but they’re not quite sure what those skills are 

and I think knowing more precisely what it is that the effective communicators are 

doing enables audiences to distinguish between the form, the structure of what 

someone’s saying, and its content, if you like. I think it may mean that audiences are in 

a better position to judge whether or not a speaker is worth taking seriously. 

Callum:  OK. It’s important to know what good communicators are doing so you 

can separate the form and techniques from the ‘content’, so you can 

separate the ‘how’ and the ‘what’! Then you can judge the content 

properly. Now good speeches are memorable so any rhetorical technique 

that makes the audience remember your message is going to be very 

useful.  

Jackie:  Listen to these three extracts from speeches made by Winston Churchill, 

when he was prime minister of Britain, Boutros Ghali, when he was 

Secretary General of the United Nations, and Margaret Thatcher, when 

she was Prime Minister of Britain.  They all illustrate a rhetorical device 

- used very frequently by politicians - known as THE LIST OF THREE.  

As you’ll hear, this can be a list of three identical items or different ones. 

Voices  

Winston Churchill: 

Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few. 

Boutros Boutros Ghali 

There is an awareness that the United Nations, for all its setbacks, is recognised for 

having done so much, so well and in such a short span of time 

Margaret Thatcher 

He wanted the commission to be the executive and he wanted the council of ministers to 

be the senate. No! No! No! 

Jackie:  Three very effective lists of three! Listen again. 

Voices (repeat) 

Callum:  And Max Atkinson explains that, like all rhetorical devices, lists of three 

are effective in many languages.  

Max Atkinson  

One of the interesting things about these devices is that, as far as we know, they’re not 

specific to any one language - they seem to work cross-culturally.  So if one thinks, for 

example, of the French revolution, the slogan was 'liberty, equality, fraternity' – a list of 

three. And you find that in many political environments. Hitler's slogan was 'ein Ein 

Volk, ein Reich, ein Führer' - one people, one empire, one leader... and you find many 

political slogans have that structure. 

Callum:  Next, we asked Max Atkinson to talk about one of the most common and 

powerful rhetorical tricks used in political speeches - a device he calls 

CONTRASTS.  This device simply puts together two contrasting words 

or phrases. Here’s Tony Blair contrasting ‘despite’ and ‘because’ … 

Tony Blair 

We are not going to win despite our beliefs.  We will only win because of our beliefs!   

Jackie:  Max Atkinson believes that politicians love this device of “contrasts” 

because it is like a cue, a sign, for the audience to applaud! It tells the 

audience when to clap and politicians love applause! 

Max Atkinson  

At a purely technical level, one of the problems audiences have, if you like, is coming in 

on time.  And it’s very important if a speaker wants to be applauded that he provides 

audiences with very clear completion points so they know when they’ve finished and 

they know when they can come in. And one of the things that these simple contrasts do 

is to enable audiences to anticipate the end of the line and therefore to come in 

immediately the speaker has finished. 

Callum:  Here’s Tony Blair again. Notice how the simple contrast between 

‘despite’ and ‘because’ gives his sentence a neat shape and indicates 

when the audience should respond!  

Tony Blair 

We are not going to win despite our beliefs.  We will only win because of our beliefs!   

Jackie:  Let’s end our look at rhetorical tricks in political speeches by listening to 

a famous speech from William Shakespeare’s play Julius Caesar, which 

begins with the words: Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears! 

So imagine please - we’re in Ancient Rome, in the year 44 BC. Julius 

Caesar, the Roman Emperor, has been murdered by Brutus, one of 

Rome’s most popular politicians. It’s Caesar’s funeral. Sombre music.  

Throngs of people. Brutus has made a speech to the crowd justifying 

Caesar’s murder and the crowd agree. 

Callum:  But now Mark Antony, a young friend of Caesar, steps forward.  He’s 

been given permission by Brutus to speak at the funeral. He stands 

beside the coffin of his murdered friend. Mark Antony wants to persuade 

the crowd that Caesar was NOT a personally ambitious man and that he 

was unjustly murdered. 

Jackie:  It’s a brilliantly persuasive speech. We’re just going to hear the opening 

two lines and as you listen can you catch any rhetorical devices at work? 

Mark Antony 

Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears. 

I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him. 

Callum:  Well, Mark Antony contrasts the words 'bury' and 'praise'. And he uses 

this contrast after addressing the audience by a list of three - he calls 

them 'friends', 'Romans' and 'countrymen'. And Mark Antony also uses a 

poetic image – 'lend me your ears' - to mean simply 'listen to me!'  So we 

hear three tricks in a row - a list of three, a poetic image, and a contrast. 

Mark Antony (repeat) 

Callum:  Well, now you must be experts in political rhetoric! We've talked about 

politicians and leaders making speeches, but what about the rest of us? 

Maybe you have to do a presentation at school or university. Perhaps 

your job sometimes involves public speaking, or you have to do a speech 

for a friend's wedding or birthday. 

Jackie:  A lot of people really hate public speaking. And later on in the 

programme, we're going to hear from Sandy Miller, who can offer expert 

advice on presentations. But, first of all, let's hear from Nadim, a Syrian 

student studying at the University of Newcastle in the UK. He did a 

presentation about his research work and he actually won a prize for his 

presentation because it was so good. But was Nadeem, like all of us can 

be, rather nervous about having to do a presentation?