Kennedy

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We go through presidents almost as fast as we go through underwear. The shortest presidential term is 31 days and the longest presidential term is 4,422 days served by William Henry Harrison and Franklin D. Roosevelt, respectively. After election, every president in US history has presented an inaugural address. On January 20, 1961, John F. Kennedy made his inaugural address to a group of people in the freezing cold. Kennedy’s speech served to unite the people against poverty, tyranny, and disease and to gain support for world peace. In John F. Kennedy’s Inaugural Address he achieved his purpose through the use of parallel structure, antithesis, and balance. In Kennedy's speech it is arguable that there is parallel structure in every sentence. The parallelism that will be the focus today are repetition and anaphora. Repetition and anaphora are two very similar things but instead of just a repetition of words or phrases, an anaphora is specifically repetition in the beginning of successive phrases, clauses, or lines. A large portion of this speech is the anaphora "To." At first he says "To those" multiple times and then there is a change to "To our" and "To that." The phrase "To those" was used to address people who the US was giving something to, either that something be loyalty or aid. Then Kennedy uses "To our" and "To that" to address the people we wanted something from or specifically to offer a "special pledge". Usually the repetition of a word or phrase is used to emphasize the word itself, but this repetition was used to emphasize the change from "those" to "our." This change allowed a comparison of two extremes and created a better connotation on "our" which accentuated a sense of togetherness in the people. This repeti... ... middle of paper ... ...whether or not we do something everyone would live virtually meaningless lives. Fear is one of the most effective pathos emotions and in this line it shows pathos at its finest hour. Furthermore, Kennedy instills even more fear into the people in the balance, "For only when our arms are sufficient beyond doubt can we be certain beyond doubt that they will never be employed." Even though this line is so scary it also, at the same time, pans out the truth; the line makes a person stop and really ponder the idea that we can only be safe if we can defend ourselves. Kennedy's Inaugural Speech is an unforgettable one. At the end of this speech most people would've taken action against poverty if they weren't so appalled and/or completely frozen. Nevertheless, Kennedy was able to warm the hearts of the people through the use of parallel structure, antithesis, and balance.

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