Rhetorical Analysis Of Beyond Vietnam

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On the fourth of April in 1967, Michael King Jr, also known as Martin Luther King Jr, spoke to the American public in the speech titled Beyond Vietnam—A Time to Break Silence. Throughout this speech, King addressed a conflict that occurred during the late 1960’s which was extremely controversial; the Vietnam War. In the speech King detailed his position on the war and particularly discussed why he was against fighting in Vietnam. King utilized many rhetorical devices in order to explain the reasons why he was against this armed conflict. The rhetorical devices that are utilized the most in the speech is specifically logos and anecdotes. Through the use of rhetorical devices, King thrived in convincing his audience into believing that entering the war was a tragic mistake. In the speech, King used many anecdotes and logos to strengthen the persuasiveness of his argument in order to lead the audience into believing the reasons of why the war was negative. One of the many types of rhetorical strategies present in the speech is Logos. Logos is a type of rhetorical appeal that utilizes information to persuade the reader into believing the author’s argument. King utilized Logos in the speech as an effort to persuade the …show more content…

Anecdotes are a rhetorical strategy in which the author provides story pertaining to the topic of the reading. In the speech, anecdotes were used when King detailed stories that related to the racial conflicts and the war. King discussed the experiences he felt when he walked through the streets of numerous ghettos in the summer. When King addressed his personal experience in the ghettos, he informed the men in the ghetto that “Social change comes most meaningfully through nonviolent action” One of the many men in the ghetto responded back to King with “What about Vietnam? They (The men) ask if our own nation wasn’t using massive doses of violence to solve its

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