Obama Inaugural Address Analysis

It is through adopting a distinctive voice that composers are able to convey a particular point of view to the audience. “It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.” “We do not believe that in this country freedom is reserved for the lucky, or happiness for the few” “Ask not what your country can do for you-ask what you can do for your country” These are the words of three great men, three great individuals, three great presidents who all used their very distinctive presidential voices to impact the world around them and to instigate significant positive change within the society which they looked over. The individuals who all used their distinctive Presidential, Egalitarian, and Nationalist voices to impact the environment around them are Abraham Lincoln, through his Gettysburg address, presented on the 19th of November 1863. John Fitzgerald Kennedy’s
The presidential and nationalist voice of power that he adopts throughout the speech aids in delivering his specific ideas and future endeavours which he references throughout the speech. Through “Together we” in the tone of his voice the anaphora and the use of inclusive language, as he addresses the public, he conveys the importance of moving forward as a nation together as one body. Within the first stanza of the speech Obama states the inclusive word ‘we’ several times, “We gather…, We affirm…, We recall…”. Through using the word, ‘we’, and repletion he reiterates that he is one of the people and he does not want to be thought of as just the president of the United States, but as a man for the people, voted in by the people. This particular point of view is based on his effort to remove the focus of importance on the title of the President, and relocating it to the roles and responsibilities of the position