Hillary Clinton Rhetorical Analysis

2016 was figured to be a year where everyone would be treated equally. It was the year that the new generations were supposed to step up to the task to rid the country of inequality. However as far as women, racial, and LGBT rights have come there are still issues on these topics popping up all over our beloved nation. Despite how far we have come in equality in our country we often forget how we got here. In the 1990’s women’s rights were still a touchy subject to some countries. However at the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women in 1995 Hillary Clinton, a Harvard Law School graduate and wife of former president Bill Clinton, was nominated to speak about the problems that women and young girls were forced to face in other countries.

With her speech in hand, Hillary was determined to make an impact in the lives of anyone who had enough courage to change the laws to protect women and their families. In 2016 many high school students either forget or haven’t learned about the obstacles that women in other countries face or they haven’t been exposed to the cruelty that even innocent newborn girls have to go through. Be that as it may these cruelties are still continuing to this day. However Hillary Clinton has helped America to reach this point that we have almost broken broken through the highest glass ceiling by speaking out and using rhetoric and common fallacies to persuade a movement.
Using literary devices and rhetoric can help persuade, inspire, and change the minds of an audience.

Hillary Clinton starts using rhetorical devices in her third paragraph to spring her ideas into motion and sparking interest in listeners. Using ethos helps others comprehend the struggle that Hillary and women all over have had to overcome obstacles that confront them. In the speech, pathos is used to get viewers and listeners to think about their own values, beliefs, and emotions. Pathos is used more heavily in the fourth paragraph. The fifth paragraph Hillary used pathos again and her words could have easily lit a bitter flame in feminists. “There are some who wonder whether the lives of women and girls matter to economic and political progress around the globe” Hillary argues. This statement says that in some countries women are still thought of as less than or not as important as any regular man. This device is used very wisely in Hillary’s speech at the beginning to already get readers

provoked.
The eighth paragraph in Hillary’s speech includes the ideas that if women are given the same rights and tools that men are given not only will the woman flourish but so will her family.This is another example of Hillary using pathos by evoking emotion into viewers. She decides to use an anaphora in her paragraph as well to help get her point across. An example from hillary is “If women are free from violence, their families will flourish. If women have a chance to work and earn as full and equal partners in society, their families will flourish.”
In the ninth paragraph Hillary uses ethos because she is credible about what she is talking about.

She says that has been around the world and has first-hand seen the struggles that women and children have had to face. Hillary once again uses an anaphora when she says “Over the past 25 years, I have,” and “Over the past two and a half years, I have…” and by also using I have met… to start a lot of her sentences. Hillary goes on to explain what she has seen about the different struggles that women in all countries face and how she has studied and learned about their personal and social battles. Hillary also talks about the major and important women that she has met. These women have changed the way women are perceived and cared for in their countries. By introducing women who have made a change Hillary focuses on inspiring others to do the

same.
In the last couple of paragraphs of the speech, Hillary starts to explain the conflict that actually happen to women and young girls. Explaining the struggles that even girl babies can face is a way of using pathos. The way that Hillary explains called imagery and this was a very useful tool to use when wanting people to feel like they are at the time of the event happening. This way Hillary is sure to capture attention of the audience. An example of the imagery that was used in this paragraph is “It is a violation of human rights when babies are denied food, or drowned, or suffocated, or their spines broken, simply because they are born girls.” Again Hillary uses anaphora by repeating “It is a violation of human rights,” to get her point across that the torture that women are put through is not okay. That these “traditions” should not be tolerated anymore and we as an audience can change how people are allowed to act towards women.
To conclude Hillary’s use of rhetoric is a foolproof instrument to influence onlookers to want to make a change in the way women are treated around the world. 2016 is almost over but there has been differences made since this speech was given. Be that as it may 2016 was not the year where everyone was treated equally, however women have come so far and have broken through high glass ceilings that we could not have dreamed of. Maybe 2016 was not the year for equal treatment for women but who is to say that 2017 can not be the year for us to change how women are seen. This is the kind of attitude that viewers will have after reading or hearing this inspiring speech by Hillary Clinton.