I didn't get that... could you put that in writing?

Do written text or an oral presentation rely heavily on the intended audience for it to be effective? I believe it does and I think that text is the most effective overall. Let me demonstrate why this is the most effective form of communication. First, written text holds accountability whereas oral presentations can be denied or ignored even if it has been recorded. Secondly, written text relies on the reader’s understanding whereas an oral presentation tends to rely on images such as props or PowerPoint.

Since we have been discussing events from the past that has both used written text and oral presentation, it is only appropriate to address one of the most heartfelt written texts that found its end during the beginning of the Cold War. This effective form of communication was the written text of Anne Frank’s Dairy. I believe that if she had orally presented what had happened to her from her dairy it would have lost something. It would have dulled the pure emotions that a stranger could relate to when they read about her sorrows (Frank, 1945).

Oral presentations are flashy and do not have the endurance as written text. Long after any recordings of oral presentations are gone there will be writing and as much as I love technology we can not be certain it will remain reliable as writing. An example of written text endurance that was written approximately 2,000 years ago and was found a couple of years after WWII were the Dead Sea Scrolls (The Ancient Library of Qumran and Modern Scholarship). This I believe is the optimal proof of endurance.

To conclude, I have to say that oral presentations were intended for fast information, where written text takes awhile to absorb and can be reread if one forgets its meaning.

http://www.ibiblio.org/expo/deadsea.scrolls.exhibit/Today/today.html
http://www.annefrank.com/ (Last Entry was 1945, Published in 1947)