President Obama’s speech, given on June 4, 2009 in Cairo, Egypt, was a current event everyone who lives in the U.S. should be aware of considering almost all of us as a nation were affected by the events of September 11th, 2001. Obama’s speech was fantastic in many ways, but especially because someone with little to no political knowledge could understand the message clearly. His points were apparent and presented eloquently. The reasons the talk was so effective and listenable is directly related to who and where he spoke, the simple yet extremely efficient structure, the support content of the speech, and the delivery method tied to his language used. Obama’s Cairo speech shows his high level of listenability. Listenability is a term that might be somewhat confusing when first seen or heard. One may think that it can mean the ability to listen, but this word means be the reverse. One way to view the difference is that the audience listens while the presenter creates a listenable speech. In order for most people to be interested in what someone has to say, there must be some level of the conversation between the audience and the speaker that contains listenability. When speaking, the focus should be on the audience, not the speaker. The main difference between a good public speech and a great speech is when the communication is listener-centered (O’Brien 20). One way to create a listenable speech is by analyzing the audience. This is a piece of the Strategy keys according to O’Brien. She refers to this set of keys as if it were the brains of the speech. Obama chose to speak at the University in Cairo for several reasons. First, Cairo is the capitol of Egypt and would be an obvious choice if someone wanted to grab the attention... ... middle of paper ... ...ld Make.” Guardian.co.uk. Guardian, 4 June 2009. Web. 27 Mar. 2011. . O’Brien, Liz. A Speaker’s Resource - Listener-Centered Public Speaking. New York: McGraw, 2009. Print. Porter, Keith. “US Egypt Relations - Profile of US Egyptian Relationship.” About.com. The New York Times Co., n.d. Web. 27 Mar. 2011. . Reynolds, Paul. “Obama Speech: An Analysis.” News.bbc.co.uk. BBC, 4 June 2009. Web. 27 Mar. 2011. . The White House - Office of the Press Secretary. “Remarks by the President on a New Beginning.” Remarks President Cairo University 6-04-09. The White House, 4 June 2009. Web. 24 Mar. 2011. .
The structure of a speech is how it is organized. In President Barack Obama’s address to the nation, the structure of his speech is organized into three parts: a sincere opening, the main point, and then a sincere closing. In the opening of his speech, President Obama offers condolences and is sincere to the situation at hand. As he progresses in his speech, he reaches his main point of the need for a more restricted gun control policy. In the body of his speech, he loses some sincerity and focuses on the present situation and how to resolve the issue. Then, he closes his speech the way he began it, by being sincere and reaching out to the ones who were suffering. This particular way of organizing his speech was effective in supporting his argument. By opening his speech in a sincere way, he caught the attention of anyone listening because of his kind words. After he had their attention, he addressed the need to come together as a nation and end the awful violence. Then he ended by offering comfort to families. This specific structure buries the more controversial topic of gun control which causes people to feel more sympathetic making them more willing to listen to his message even if they support the right to bear
Many would argue that President Obama is one of the most effective speakers in the decade. With his amazing speeches, he captivates his audience with his emotion and official tone.
Despite these generalizations, of which the President failed to fully support, his speech was quite effective. Most notably, Mr. Obama used anecdotes for various reasons, such as serving as springboards for more relevant issues, as well as to, more importantly, demonstrate pathos and logos. The latter two rhetorical elements were effectively employed by President Obama, helping to spur emotion (pathos) as well as to both support his claims and form logical conclusions (logos). Though, as previously mentioned, Obama occasionally presents assumptions of which he fails to support, Mr. Obama’s mastery of rhetorical strategies dwarfs most of the downsides of his address. All in all, it appears to be quite evident that President Obama presents effective rhetoric within his State of the Union Address.
The night before the anniversary of 9/11 in 2013, Barack Obama delivered a speech to the United States of America on the subject of Syria’s inhumane use of chemical weapons on its own citizens. The United States’ intelligence analysts estimated that more than 1,400 civilians were killed due to the chemical warheads that were launched on the area right outside of Damascus. In President Barack Obama’s address to the nation on Syria, he attempts to persuade the American people to support his plan of a targeted air strike on Syria. By describing the victims of Syria, giving reasons for the inhumanity of the Syrian government, and reinforcing his credibility,
From the beginning, and throughout his speech he used in the most effective way rhetorical tools to support his beliefs. The rhetoric tool such as ethos, pathos and logos. He used ethos used to gives his audience a better understanding of who his character is. For him to establish an effective speech of ethos, Obama had to present himself in a way that will make the audience believe in his beliefs as well. In this speech Obama creates his ethos in many different ways that gives his speech not only credibility but, validity also. Obama does
Acknowledging their audience is something both Kennedy and King did. They both gave powerful addresses that caused great movement and change to happen, by the way they spoke and their presentation being diverse. Kennedy used note cards and noticeably looked down at them due to the fact that he changed his works up until the night before he gave the speech. The consequence to doing this made it so that he did not have time to memorize it. Due to this he was not as practiced and prepared. On the other hand, King is a practiced speaker (being a baptist minister for many years). He was a little more powerful and you could feel and see his emotion because he did not look down at note cards and knew his speech perfectly and knew when to raise his voice and show more emotion on his face. Kings crowd got exceedingly noisy at times (Martin Luther King ‘I Have … ‘). King was voicing his thoughts to the minority. His audience was mostly African American, but included a few white people supporting the cause. You can hear them shout.”hallelujah” or “amen” and clapping throughout his address (Martin Luther King ‘I Have … ‘). Compared to Kennedy’s audience which was much smaller and mostly upper class citizens. It was freezing outside that day and only a few people were brave enough to go out in the cold. This crowd did not shout out or clap as much (John F. Kennedy ‘inauguration … ‘ ). Although the audiences and speakers were slightly adverse, both addresses were impressive and
He wants safe and secure life for all people living on this great nation. Obama not only uses the strategy of emotional stories of children to persuade his audience, he uses real mass shooting events to capture the audience emotions, as invites all the country to step with him and face this problem that’s threaten our safety. During the speech his reveling many sorrow events to encourage us to take this big move with him. Obama connects to the audience and expresses to them that he is the one that is going to make proper changes to this great
Primarily he starts out his address by speaking directly to his audience, the American people. He states: “We know we share this pain with all of the people of our country. This is truly a national loss.” By doing so he establishes who his intended audience is, which is very important in a speech like this. It helps the audience feel a greater connection to the speaker since he is addressing them directly and relating to them.
Because of the controversial issues surrounding President G.W. Bush before and during the time of his reelection, the acceptance speech that he delivered is an important piece of literature to study. This diplomatic speech is a piece of rhetorical contribution because the motives and meanings behind any President’s speech is significant to us as citizens of the United States of America. It further warrants our attention because if the audience is able to comprehend the inner meanings and motives behind a presidential speech, then they will eventually be able to differentiate the actual stances and platforms of future presidential candidates and nominees.
From his extremely vivid imagery at the beginning to his conclusion that America plans to seek a solution with Russia and other nations, the president’s flow from using pathos to logos to ethos made his speech very effective and compelling. His argument was backed up and supported all through out his speech, which helped his audience believe that what he was saying is true and important. However, his speech would have been nothing without the implication and opinion that America is the strongest nation in the world. Although this point is debatable, it is our duty to help other nations. We definitely do an excellent job at helping other nations and always having their best interests at heart. I believe this was the main goal for Obama’s speech; a plan to protect the United States. The use of logos, ethos and pathos just helped his speech to be more persuasive and
The structure of the speech enhances the ability for all people in the audience to connect. Beginning with an intimate remark and closing with a broad regard marks the address as both authentic and propelling. Nevertheless, what is most effective is Kennedy’s skill to access the atmosphere of the crowd and examine the circumstances of the juncture that is primarily the cause for the prosperity of this distinguished speech.
He makes sure his audience connects with him directly by making them feel at his level, and at hiss. This way he connects to the audience, and in exchange, helps his statement of unity. Using various examples of parallelism, anaphora and refrain, Obama brands the theme of equality and togetherness in our country throughout the speech, vital to gaining the respect of his audience. Obama recalls the ‘enduring strength of the constitution’ by delving into the past alluding to America’s allegiance to the Declaration of Independence by quoting “we hold these truths. that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”.
President Obama speaks in different registers throughout the speech--—effectively code switching to reach his different audiences and accomplish his purposes. He begins his speech by quoting the Bible, using that as a springboard into his
Bhorat, H. M. (2013, June 20). A Conversation on President Obama’s Trip to Africa (web audio recording). Retrieved March 29, 2014, from Brookings: http://www.brookings.edu/research/interviews/2013/06/20-obama-trip-africa-kimenyi-schneidman
On July 27, 2004, Barack Obama made arguably his most important speech, “The Audacity of Hope”, at the Democratic National Convention Keynote Address. These conventions are for political parties to announce a winner for nomination. All the way through his piece, Obama focuses on connecting Americans and himself to the audience. In fact, at the time, Barack Obama was a US Senate candidate for the United States president, and in making this speech, was offered a window for raising his popularity. Throughout “The Audacity of Hope” speech, Barack Obama implements three main devices to raise his political popularity: repetition, abstract language, and structure.