Comparing John F. Kennedy And Martin Luther King's Speech

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Two great men who stood their ground and fought for what they believed in gave two incredible speeches in the 1960s that may have changed America forever. These two men had no idea what this country would accomplish after these great addresses. John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther king’s speeches to the nation appeal to emotions, call action to different audiences, and have differing opinions on the nation that make them comparable but not completely different. To accomplish a great movement these men needed their audience to be awoken and come to action. Getting people to get up and act according to your words is a trait that Kennedy and King alike possessed. Kennedy knew his facts and was an educated man. When speaking to his audience he …show more content…

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

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