Rhetorical Analysis Of Kennedy's Speech

This was one of his favorite weapons in his arsenal. It is because, through his use of parallelism, he is able to express his perspective in a smooth manner. He is also able to skillfully manipulate the audience into cementing their attention into his speech. He can even add a strong foundation for his speech and he can easily follow up and build his case further through his resourcefulness with parallelism. Parallelism might be the best tool John F Kennedy has mastered when building a speech. He is so resourceful with it, that he is able to construct powerful statements to attract and cement attention. This is clearly evident when he describes science as “power to abolish all forms of human poverty and all forms of human life”, using powerful words that strikes fear into his audience, therefore further cementing their attention to him. He also does this when he proclaims his plans for conserving power for goals associated in achieving more freedom for his nation, and perhaps this is one of the biggest reasons for the fame for his speech. As one can see, it easily engages the audience to his

On a cold January day America’s newly appointed president John F. Kennedy delivered his inauguration address that was incredibly important to America’s success during the Cold War. Kennedy uses his speech as a call to arms, but not only to America but the World and our allies as a whole. He uses his strong powerful voice to appeal to the ethics of the country in the beginning of his speech telling America about the promise we made when we were founded and that we must uphold it still today, telling America we must make a difference. Kennedy also uses ethics to explain that we the people are united no matter what your background or where you are from, he refers to the Americas as one place, because he wants for us to feel unified not divided. Furthermore Kennedy’s use of powerful imagery, logic and pathos allows for him to effectively call the people of the World together during this terrible time.

Throughout Kennedy’s speech you can see many different types of these devices first off, I would like to bring your attention to parallelism. The definition of Parallelism is “Uses of words or phrases in a similar structure”. In his speech he come right out of the gate in the first 5-6 paragraphs and begins to show this. For example on Page (283) Kennedy says, “To those who old allies whose cultural and spiritual origins we share, we pledge the loyalty for old faithful friends. United, there is little we cannot do in a host of co-operative (SAS) ventures. Divided, there is little we can do, for we dare not meet a powerful challenge at odds and split asunder”. Furthermore he then directly goes into his next statement by saying “To those”. I also think that one of the man reasons his speech captivated not only America's people but many other nations, was due to how he connected with the audience.

Kennedy's speech so successful was his use of Anaphora. By using anaphora he made sure to repeat common words to not only keep the attention of the crowd, but to also emphasize the point he was trying to get across. An example of Anaphora can be found in the eleventh paragraph of Kennedy’s speech, “We will have difficult times. We’ve had difficult times in the past, but we -- and we will have difficult times in the future.” His use of the word “difficult” shows that there will never be a time without a struggle and the public should become comfortable with struggles and that it is nothing that as a united nation we can not overcome.

Kennedy uses pathos to begin his speech, when he says the following, “I'm only going to talk to you just for a minute or so this evening, because I have some -- some very sad news for all of you -- Could you lower those signs, please? -- I have some very sad news for all of you, and, I think, sad news for all of our fellow citizens, and people who love peace all over the world; and that is that Martin Luther King was shot and was killed tonight in Memphis, Tennessee.” (Kennedy) Kennedy touches into the sadness not only he is feeling, but many are feeling. He does this by his usage of the word ‘sad’, in contrast with ‘love’ and ‘peace’. Also, he speaks personally with the crowd when asking them to lower their signs. This makes him seem relatable to the crowd. Kennedy uses

The first rhetorical strategies is alliteration. Throughout Kennedy’s whole speech he uses alliteration, which is put into connotation as, multiple words in a sentence that have the same beginning sound. For example his first sentence. “Simultaneous and identical actions of the United States Steel and other leading steel corporations, increasing steel prices by some 6 dollars a ton…” (line 1-5). In his opening sentence Kennedy uses the letter “-s” about six times, in the words “simultaneous”, “state”, “steel”, and “some”. Using the same sound really emphasizes, and grabs ahold of the audiences attention. Another example is, “If this rise in the cost of steel is imitated by the rest of the industry, instead of rescinded, it would increase the cost of homes…” (line 22-25). In this sentence he uses the alliterations of the “-in” sound in the words

On June 26, 1963, the famous words “Ich bin ein Berliner” changed the world. These words, which in English mean “I am a Berliner,” were delivered by John F. Kennedy in West Berlin. His speech was viewed worldwide and brought national attention to the Berlin Crisis and the Cold War. Today, most people have heard about the speech, but may not know a whole lot about it. They may ask themselves the following questions:

.Finally, Kennedy added liability to his concept by concluding his speech with the key to unity. He proposed that if citizens base their lives upon “ask not what America would do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man.”, they would successfully achieve unity. Continuing with his use of pathos, and the previously established ethos, Kennedy successfully created the last literary device: logos.

In John F. Kennedy’s inaugural speech, he worked on persuading audience or listeners for the idea which is American should do anything that should be done to assure the survival and the success of liberty. In his mind, American should hold their liberty forever, further guarantee other country freedom. Kennedy really used a lot of rhetorical strategies in his speech. Of course, he used those strategies successfully. One of the rhetorical devices he used was antithesis. Another rhetorical device that I found out was metaphor which is a good way to create a good image, further, make audience believed in his mind.

Kennedy’s speech carries with it a dauntless rhythm of persuasiveness, emboldening and inspiring his audience through emotional conviction and personal attribution. With parallelism and juxtaposition, John F. Kennedy was able to capture the minds and hearts of the American people. During the vast majority of the address, he uses inclusivity (us, we, our) with the audience to show his personal dedication to the public and mankind as a whole. Kennedy’s dedication to his people and god was enough to gain the support of the nation, from both political parties; he proclaims that it was “not the victory of a party, but a celebration of freedom…” Kennedy does this in an attempt to establish his credibility as a just and equal leader, who saw past the petty divisions of our bipartisan dichotomy. Aside from this instance, JFK states later that he is a “fellow citizen of the world…” to appeal to his international audience. As much as Kennedy addressed his fellow man, he also referenced God in many occasions throughout his speech. Considering that at the time of its delivery 84% of the

The two speeches that were discussed in Germany about the berlin wall are similar but also different from each other. John f. Kennedy’s speech focuses on how he has never heard of a wall being put up to keep the people of Germany a divided continent. He also states that his people in his country take pride in being able to meet the people of West Berlin. To add on he also says “I know of no town, no city, that has been besieged for 18 years that still lives with the vitality and the force, and the hope and the determination of the city of West Berlin”. With that statement it lets people know that berlin is a strong and determined country. John demands freedom and in one of the lines from his speech he says “Freedom is indivisible, and

To start off John F. Kennedy was giving his speech during the inauguration, talking to the citizens of America. He was giving a very powerful speech that included metaphors, rhetoric devices, and SOAPS. I say that because he used that to capture the audience's attention. He starts off by talking about the war and those who fought for us, to be brave like them. That they were not looking for power like most of them were, that’s when he used a metaphor saying those who “sought power by riding the back of the tiger ended up inside”. Saying that they were foolish to even think they can gain that power they don’t deserve, how they talk about doing good, instead of actually doing it. Kennedy was making a type of statement, on how we the americans should show more compassion to those who don’t have anything.

President Kennedy utilizes rhetorical appeals and a variety of figurative language to formally express his beliefs and goals in a strong and eloquent manner.

Kennedy begins his speech expressing how “the world is very different” from what it used to be. He uses multiple rhetorical strategies that express and describe how he is going to lead their “very different” country by providing his audience with a sense of community. For example, Kennedy applies juxtaposition to his phrase, “United there is little we cannot do… Divided there is little we can do…” to compare what America can and can’t do when everyone is united. During the time when Kennedy was elected president, the Cold War was at peak of its period. He bravely announced that “we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty,” using the rhetorical strategy asyndeton. He uses this particular mechanism to attract his audience and give emphasis to the ideas he wants to communicate. He starts the phrase off with “we,” as he wishes to convey to his listeners that we are going to pay any price, that we are going to bear any burden, that

Ronald Reagan, in his speech, (“Berlin Wall”, 1987), the former governor and President of the United States and at the time of the Cold War, “ the most magnetic public figure in the nation”(encyclopedia.com) elucidates to his audience the consequences of residing under the influence of the Soviet Union. Reagan supports his assertion through the use of various rhetorical devices to generate logos, ethos, and pathos. His purpose is to incite a feeling of an injustice done to the people of Berlin and Soviet Allies and to bring down the Berlin Wall as “the most visible symbol of the decades-long Cold War”(History.com) between the Americans and the Soviets during the Cold War. Reagan writes in perfervid tone generated toward the people of Berlin and other Soviet allies in hopes of bringing the Cold War to an end and it is reported by CBS News that he successfully “bolstered the morale of the pro-democracy movement in East Germany”(Brinkley).