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An Analysis Of Dr. Martin Luther King's I Have A Dream Speech

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An Analysis Of Dr. Martin Luther King's I Have A Dream Speech
After the March on Washington fifty-two years ago civil rights activist Dr. Martin King Jr. delivered for the first time his "I Have a Dream Speech" at the Lincoln Memorial. During the speech, Dr. King offered inspiration and called for an end to racism in America. In fact, he spoke on his personal hopes and dreams for people of all races in his country. One of his hopes was that one day people of color would be judged based off their character, rather than their skin color. As for his dream that he expressed in speech, it was that a day would come that colored people and whites could unite and see one another as equals.

In this paper I will analyze the "I Have a Dream" speech by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. As a civil rights leader
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In fact, parallel structure was used. Dr. King used parallel structure effectively in a lot of his speeches, especially this one. He used this particular structure to engage his audience. Through the use of this technique, he was able to organize, clarify and highlight information. Every small point built up to a larger point and made his ideas tie together. “I Have A Dream” and “Now is the time” are both great examples of parallelism found in Dr. Kings speech. “I have a dream” is repeated eight times, while ‘Now is the time” is repeated four times. He used both statements to help organize things chronologically. However, he also used such structure to make things simple and easy to remember. “Now is the time” was used to clarify every step that was to be taken at that particular time. By using this statement, King asked that the people take action immediately. He wanted them to think about the things that they could start doing to help their dreams come true. The constant hearing of that phrase, allowed the audience to think in present terms. As for, “I Have A Dream” it was used to make reference to the changes that were to come. Through parallelism, different ideas came together and were connected. Dr. King structured his speech, so that he would make reference to the past, present and then the future. He started by stating the things America has went through in the past, what it was going through at that particular time and what he hope to see it go through. The parallel structure, also helped create a sense of rhythm throughout the

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