User:CynicalCoffee/sandbox

Rhetorical Appeals of the Speech:

Pathos: Kennedy’s powerful oration skills are often hailed for their ability to conjure pathos in their audience. An allusion to a biblical quote, "he maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him” constitute the highest possible emotional appeal to the pathos of a predominantly Christian nation. Kennedy builds pathos through high modality and use of absolutes in his speech such as ‘every’ and ‘never’ to heighten the stakes of his appeal. Listeners are rhetorically questioned repeatedly to recall on their own emotions, such as in “…the right to live out our lives without fear of devastation? The right to breathe air as nature provided it?”. This encourages personal emotional reflection on the presented ideas. Ideas are climaxed through the use of polysyndeton, in which commas are substituted by additional ands to add rhetorical emphasis, “‘carried by wind and water and soil and seed” and “of war and hate and oppression”. The smooth appeal to audience pathos on Kennedy’s behalf is due to the fluid nature he presented his speeches, amending and extending speeches as he delivered them live, ,

Ethos: The rhetorical power of Kennedy’s speech comes largely from its techniques to establish his ethos and foster a connection with his immediate audience. Kennedy humanises himself to the audience by using humour in the formal introductions, “Senator Bob Byrd, who earned his degree through many years of attending night law school while I am earning mine in the next 30 minutes”. This makes Kennedy’s personal ethos relatable to all in the crowd. Credibility is enhanced by allusion to three historical figures’ quotes that add majesty and persuasive weight to the speech. Kennedy then skillfully contrasts initial humour with swift transition to a somber and earnest tone, as he sets an absolute and hyperbolic parameter of his topic as the “most important topic on earth: peace”. Second person pronouns are employed in phrases such as “let us re-examine our attitude” and “we do not want a war” to unify all under his established personal ethos and the pronouns of “us” and “we” are repeated throughout the speech. This dual integration of submerging Kennedy’s ethos with the ethos of his listeners enables trust and agreement to be obtained more effectively from the audience. Thus, Kennedy’s relatable presentation interwoven with national ethos appeal enables the speech to resonate strongly with his American constituents.

Logos: Kennedy also cements an appeal to logos by using techniques that allow direct comparison between two ideals. Antithesis is used when two contrasting ideals are presented in the same sentence, such as “sudden revolution in human nature but on a gradual evolution in human institutions”, “only destroy and never create” and “dynamic, not static”. The principle he wants to cultivate with the audience is clearly portrayed through the negation of one of the ideals or use of a conjunction to highlight the preferred ideal. In this way, the audience feels it has had balanced treatment of polar opposites and has made a logical decision. It is in this way that Kennedy carefully reconstructs the notion of what peace is, through a disassociation with prior connotations of a “Pax Americana”,. This rhetorical device is also strengthened by recurring parallelism through Kennedy’s speech in phrases, such as “where the weak are safe and the strong are just” and “We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children's future.”, which use similar length and sentence construction. Logos appeal is reinforced through the measured and metronomic structure that pervades through the speech, as well as comparisons between conflicting ideals being easily accepted through this clear speech structure.

Kairos: The consideration of the speech’s kairos richly enhances the gravity of Kennedy’s content. The choices of the rhetor are inextricably linked to their context, as their choices are consciously weighted with what impact it will have on audiences The direct use of Soviet leader’s names such as “Chairman Khrushchev” addresses them personally to appeal to their pathos to move away from nuclear arms creation. The kairos is auspicious, graduation ceremonies are symbolic of ending old eras, precisely analogous to the new and less adversary relationship Kennedy is attempting to forge with the Soviet Union. Furthermore, the characterisation of time as a tide has peaceful connotations. This is achieved due to the symbolism of tides as a natural, universal and harmonic motion. Peaceful symbolism is mirrored by the tone and constant pacing of the speech, with the long sentence structure and slow pace establishing a legato effect. This means the interjection of short statements are emphasised. For example, “I hope they [Soviet Union] do” and “But we have no more urgent task” are highlighted due to this contrast and placed oratory stress to prioritise the pressing nature of these two statements. It is noted that Kennedy’s inspirational language was pivotal in appealing to Soviet pathos more than predecessors, an endorsement for his exerted rhetorical choice Delivered in the context of a short several months after the closest Cold War development of nuclear conflict, the peaceful framing of this speech is inextricably countering its tense kairos.

Bose, M. (1998) ‘Words as signals: Drafting Cold War rhetoric in the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations, Congress & the Presidency, 25(1), 23-41

Braet, A.C. (1992) ‘Ethos, pathos and logos in Aristotle’s Rhetoric: A re-examination, Argumentation, 6(3), 307-320

Ritter, K. & Medhurst, J. (2004) ‘Presidential speechwriting: From the New Deal to the Reagan revolution and beyond’, No. 7, Texas A&M University Press, Texas, America

Zarefsky, D (2004) ‘Presidential rhetoric and the power of definition’, Presidential Studies Quarterly, 34(3), 607-619