Coretta And The King: An Analysis

When Coretta Scott King, civil rights activist and wife of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., died in 2006, her friend, author and activist Maya Angelou, eulogized her. In her eulogy, Angelou employs anaphora, personal anecdotes, and connotative diction in order to strengthen her pathos and memorialize and celebrate Mrs. King’s long and illustrious life.

‘Nothing mattered more to king than being an outstanding preacher. Martin Luther King had an exceptional personal some state. He was a very proud and an outspoken man. He had been ‘conditioned’ from the mere age of nine and ordained in a black church for later life purposes (1). At a young age racism surrounded him and was affected first hand. He was abused by a white mill owner purely on the colour of his skin. He also witnessed other black people suffering from violence when he saw a white mob attack and barbarically murder a black man. King was a very opinionated person and became a lead figure head publicly known on a national scale. This came to be

King continues on by affecting the reader, on an emotional level, by going through and explaining some of the unending amount of torturous events that the black community had to endure daily. In an essay by an anonymous writer it says, “He uses a dialog that reaches into the pit of your soul and places you on an emotional rollercoaster.” When he says, “when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse,

Once Dr. King arrived to Birmingham jail, he was faced with difficult conditions. An ally of his sneaked in a newspaper that was published on April 12th. There was a statement written by eight clergymen called “A Call for Unity,” which went against what King and his campaign were implementing on the streets of Birmingham, Alabama. The statement enraged Dr. King to write a response. Dr. King used logos in the letter to help support his counter argument against the clergymen. “In spite of my shattered dreams..” King wrote, “... I came to Birmingham with the hope that the religious leadership... Would see the justice.” By stating this, he showed pathos. King put into words that through the process to end segregation, there was hardship along the way, and dreams were destroyed by other people's actions who did not display care towards the black community.

As the movie began, I noticed the story was not just about King. Many other iconic leaders of the SNCC and the SCLC that helped bring forth an awareness of black inequality and triumph to end voter discrimination aided King. The film showed the struggle of African Americans as they fought for their right to vote. In multiple scenes, King sat with President Johnson to speak of the Black vote and how it is a step to changes in America, giving

(King 3), King continued with these “when you” statements to reiterate the fact that they keep “waiting” yet no action was being taken by the whites. The level of cruelty from good people is what bothered King the most, “shallow understanding from people of good-will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will” (King 5) reveals pathos because King is showing that those that want segregation are knowledgeable, just

People probably only know Coretta by being the wife of Martin Luther King Jr. But what about the important things she did for this country? Coretta put her life in danger for believing what she supported and was right. Mrs. King also had programs to stay together with the community. She supported other people’s beliefs and doing that gave some people motivation that anything is possible. People also have to give her credit for even being Martin Luther King Jr.’s wife. His family had to go through a lot with him being an African American trying to change history. With that being said, now on our time people don’t go to that person and talk about them, everybody knows they bash to the family even more. Coretta had to deal with a lot of

When King begins talking about the hardships African Americans went through he uses repetition to show the severity of segregation in the city of Birmingham. “...when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers...when you have seen hate filled policemen curse, kick and even kill your black brothers and sisters…” By repeating the

Fairclough particularly cites his lack of organisational skills in Albany and in the SCLC as evidence that King was not solely the most important factor in the development in black civil rights; his lack of involvement in grassroots organisations made his impact only focus on legal matters, rather than actually changing the opinions of the people. Even traditionalists like Carson placed importance on the support of King’s peers and family in helping him in his work, and without their influence he would have much more limited influence in the Civil Rights

King describes the hardships black people have endured, both emotionally and physically at the hands of racial segregation. He does this by using lines such as “unsolved bombings of Negro homes and churches”, “…hate filled policemen curse, kick, brutalize and even kill your black brothers and sisters with impunity”, “…long years of oppression”, as well as “blemished and scarred [the body of Christ] through social neglect and fear”. By using words such as “kick,” “brutalize” and “kill”

King and the black community had to overcome to organize a successful carpool, The leaders needed people to volunteer their cars to be driven heavily and by strangers. The carpool had to be planned and executed as precisely as a military campaign. To do this, an intricate web of pick up and drop off points had to be created along with a communication system to connect those needing a ride with those offering a ride. Throughout, they faced rainstorms, freezing winter mornings, mechanical breakdowns and scheduling snafus but managed to keep morale up by holding meetings to inspire those to carry on. (p.51) Mother Pollard she said, “My feet is tired, but my soul is rested?” She was satisfied with the fight to end segregation because she knew

to a digital generation for all to view and gather information. It’s mission is to positively bring the impact on the continuous struggle of King’s dream for the world, especially America. People looking for general information such as about the bus boycott will be able to find what just was they’re looking for at the King Center archive. The methods they used were distributed through the documents and about pages throughout the whole archive. The purpose of the Eric Dyson’s book is to the new generation knowledge of the king of philosophy. The man who was a scholar, pastor and husband who believed in civil rights and why it was important to succeed in order to make America a better place for us to call our home. The book explains how King kept with his preaches and speeches up until the day he took his last breath. Everyone took King’s death was filled with much hurt and surprise. “Black America mourned King’s murder so deeply because it felt like our murder” (Dyson, 2009). The methods he used were A Prophet’s Death in Three Acts as part one. Part two; Promised Land, or Wilderness and part three; Charismatic Black Leadership in a Prophet’s

King writes as a Clergyman, an American Citizen, a Judeo-Christian leader, a Christian Brother, a Political Moderate, a Nonviolent Direct Activist, and Anti-Segregationist, a United States Negro, a Creative Extremist, an Integrationist, and a Civil Rights Leader. All are intertwined by the common thread of moral and just activism for the betterment of Negroes in the United States, specifically Birmingham. As a member of all of these communities, he brings credibility to his argument and can speak on the behalf of both sides, even those that conflict with one another. He defines his own membership within each community according to the overall effect it will have on his refutations of the four main accusations in the public statement.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. fought for equality during the nineteen fifties and sixties. The passage “Heeding the Call”, by Diana Childress explains how his childhood experiences influenced his actions as an adult. He learned a lot from personal situations as a black male, people he looked up to as a child, and his educational background.

Another major highlight of the speech was that it contains excellent use of Aristotle’s rhetorical appeals i.e. pathos, logos and ethos. King uses pathos to emotionally connect with his black and white audience. One of his good example of pathos includes the line " I have a dream that one day right here in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers." Here King makes correct uses of pathos because in that time, Alabama was one of the state where there was