Know Your Audience - Academic Speeches

If you’re planning to speak in front of an audience of academics or of students, you may not be able to get a handle on every person who will be in the audience, but you should be able to get a rough idea. For instance, if the speech is for a class, it’ll be obvious who will be there. But if the speech is for a conference, then you might only have a rough idea of the types of people who will be there (i.e. professors of a particular discipline or certain types of students).

If you think a particularly noteworthy individual will be there—such as an expert on your topic—then this is something important to take into consideration. As we mentioned with the business speech example, it is always a good idea to run some of your more controversial ideas by a fellow student, academic, or (if possible) expert in your field. This will give you a chance to test the response you get before you have to run it by your audience.

Source of Information : Public Speaking Exposed