Analysis Of Letter From Birmingham Jail And Martin Luther King's Speech

Argumentation has followed humans from the dawn of time as a way for us to express our ideas and for our ideas to be heard. People naturally obtain the knowledge to persuade others, either backing their opinions by fact or touching others emotionally, from growing up and through their own experiences in life. We can be persuaded by a numerous amounts of different factors pertaining to the argument. There are four different types of strategies in which an argument can be presented and make the argument effective. Martin Luther King is a key example of the utilization of the strategies as he wrote, “Letter from Birmingham Jail” and Nicholas Carr also portrays the strategies with his essay, “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” Both authors perfectly

King utilizes pathos by stating, “But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at a whim; when you have seen hate filled policemen curse, kick and even kill your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society…” He intends to reach into his readers’ emotions by illustrating harsh and cruel situations that occur on a regular day basis. King uses the terms “brothers” and “sisters” to get the clergymen a feel if it was their own family and by creating that empathy thing, he controls the audience’s flow of emotion and logic. Carr’s usage of pathos is barely evident, but he does mention other people that share his same problems. He uses sources found on the internet and blog to back up his unemotional opinion which is why I believe Carr uses little to no amount of pathos in his

Kairos is the argumentative strategy that appeals to the timeliness and/or proper occasion when they present it. The timing of events is a crucial element to having a successful argument. “I think I should indicate why I am here in Birmingham, since you have been influenced by the view which argues against "outsiders coming in." I have the honor of serving as president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, an organization operating in every southern state, with headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia,” in this sentence it can be inferred that he held off on writing about equality until the his organization’s event was impending. King also delves into the word “wait” and gives it a new mean of “never going to happen” and with this explained he asserts that his movement cannot hold off any longer. His timing was impeccable because any longer then another group of blacks could have started a violent riot against the whites. Also, Carr exemplifies a correct usage of kairos because in this day in age, the world has been gravely affected by the internet. If he wrote his essay any time earlier then this argument would not be as plausible because it was only recently that people started to overuse the internet. Both composers excel with their application of this strategy and it further bolstered their