Barack Obama: a More Perfect Union

Barack Obama: A More Perfect Union (2008)
Barack Obama speaks of the time before the civil war, when the founding fathers made the declaration of independence. The declarations of independence were good, but not perfect, it had been left unfinished. The great question of slavery wasn’t properly answered. But separation isn’t over; Obama wants this generation to keep fighting for equal rights among gender, creed and color. Obamas tells about his past, how he grew up with his white grandparents, in a very poor neighborhood, but still went to one of the best schools in America.
The texts main themes are separation and hope. Through the speech Barack Obama tires to give the American people the hope, that all can reach “the American dream”, if they are willing to work for it, and change the society, for an America there is open to all races and beliefs. The second theme separation is important for Obama because, America has become more isolated among races and beliefs, even though America is a “melting pot” of different cultures. He wants to stop labels like majority and minority to be used, to describe a person’s place in society. He enhances his message by telling about his own childhood, and family, because he was raised with his white grandparents, in a very poor part of America, and still went to some of the best schools on America, which at the time he went to them, were the majority of the students at the finest schools white. He was a black man, who grew up with white people, in a black neighborhood. He communicates his message about tolerance mainly using ethos. He tells us about his childhood, where he grew up in a multicultural society. That makes us connect to him, and we begin to think, that he has a point, because he been in the good and bad part of America. Therefore he must know what he is talking about, which also makes the mode of persuasion logos, because he speaks to our logic, by using his own childhood as an excellent argument. And last but not least, does he use ethos too, by making us feel sorry for him, because of what he must have been through, to get where he is now. It is especially ethos he uses, when he speaks of slavery, because every American have feeling related to it, maybe not directly to slavery, but for the consequences slavery had, like the civil war. Where over half a million soldiers lost their lives, and he does not want the beginning for such a separation again. That is what he means when he says, at the end: “Out of many, we are truly one”, which means that we shall remember the phrase “yes we can”, for a nation to become great, it must unite its people. Take the majorities and minorities and make them one people. Barack Obama is clearly influenced by Martin Luther King in this speech, and a lot others he have done. He is influenced by him when it comes to racism, because racism is a very big subject for both Obama and it was for Martin Luther King too. Obama connects better with his audience using the Martin Luther inspired speeches, because Martin Luther was an amazing speaker, and Obama uses it to his own advantage.
Barack Obama tries to reach all of the American people, by talking about their common history, and especially by using words like “us, our, we” etc. instead of “I, mine and me”, and using all of the three modes of persuasion. So he reaches out to people of America, and they connect with him, understand him and look up to him. With the speech he tries to create a hope for the people of America, a hope for a better future, a future which seems lost after the eight years with George W. Bush in charge. Barack Obama will try to make a better America, a united America.