Preview

Rhetorical Analysis Of Letter From Birmingham Jail

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
685 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Rhetorical Analysis Of Letter From Birmingham Jail
In Martin Luther King Jr's. letter, composed to the Clergymen from Birmingham Prison, he utilizes the expository interest of ethos to build up his credibility regarding the matter of racial segregation and shamefulness. He begins off the letter with "My Dear Fellow Clergymen". By him saying this, he is putting himself on the same "level" as the ministers, sending the message that he is no short of what them and they are no superior to him. He at that point goes ahead to state, "I am here on the grounds that I have hierarchical ties here. Be that as it may, all the more essentially, I am in Birmingham since bad form is here". He is disclosing to them that he has believability on the matter of shamefulness, not on the grounds that he is the …show more content…
at that point advances to sentiment by demonstrating the trials his kin have experienced. He does this by utilizing lines, for example, "When you have seen horrendous hordes lynch your moms and fathers freely and suffocate your sisters and siblings at impulse.", and "when you have seen despise filled policeman revile, kick, and even kill your dark siblings and sisters." In these lines he is utilizing ignitable dialect like "awful crowds" and parallelism, for example, "lynch your moms and fathers voluntarily and suffocate your sisters and siblings at impulse" by utilizing this sort of dialect and sentence structure King is influencing you to imagine and feel what he needed to see his loved ones experience in those tough circumstances. All through the entire passage utilizing this sort of sentence structure and a ton of symbolism the gathering of people begins to feel what it resembles to be in King's position and feel the torment and inconveniences he needed to experience. It is truly an enthusiastic section, and utilizing this feeling toward the start of his letter catches the consideration of his group of onlookers. This is precisely what King needed with a specific end goal to influence the crowd to feel the compelling feeling and agony he felt, and induce you to continue perusing the letter to hear what he needs to say in regards to these shock of …show more content…
He is extremely enthusiastic in his dialect and tone in this piece of the letter, yet still makes a solid contention for rationale. Notwithstanding the mind-boggling enthusiastic and individual venture included King still enables rationale to win along these lines loaning him an enormous measure of credibility.The utilization of logos in the contention made by King demonstrates that reason rules over feeling, at any rate in the words he could get on paper. Indeed, even the utilization of paper was withheld at first to King but his words radiate through the murk of legislative issues and the profundities of tenderness. Regardless of what convictions were held all through Alabama at the time, it is difficult to differ with a point appeared well and good. Soon after the entry said above he utilizes a lot of emotion to move down his point. He asks "Will we be radicals for abhor or for adoration:", while this is an interest to emotion it is straightforwardly moving down the conclusion came to through utilizing logos. While at first baffled, subsequent to supposing it through he chooses being a radical is truly extremely acceptable. He even uses ethos to go down the logos of his earlier explanations by contrasting himself with verifiable and scriptural

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Martin Luther King Jr. utilizes Ethos, pathos, and logos in his “Letter from Birmingham Jail.” King uses rhetorical devices to help him embody his thoughts and emotions into his letter. At the start, he employs ethos when he states, “Dear Fellow Clergymen” (King 1). This implies that he is one of the clergymen, to whom who he is writing too. Within King’s “Letter”, he responds to charges and assumptions brought against him in the letter from Birmingham clergy a few days earlier in which they suggested that he should not be a Birmingham overseeing the protests of the Blacks. King’s “Letter” was written as an apologia in which he defends his actions.…

    • 386 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    everglades

    • 347 Words
    • 2 Pages

    King’s response to a letter published in the local paper known as "A Call For Unity". Local clergy criticized King and labeled him extremist in the published letter. King's response is a masterpiece in American rhetoric. He goes through a logical response to each point. His over all tone is polite. At the end he dramicly shifts tone and shifts from straight logic to appeal to the pathos of the situation. After building the logical case justifiying his actions, he is able to shift to an appeal to the clergyment to join him.…

    • 347 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The clergymen thought they should negotiate and pursue things through the use of court, yet King shows how they did negotiate, but what they agreed upon lasted a short period of time. Overall King’s argument was more convincing because the structure of his letter made me, the reader, feel that his direct approach was the only option to achieve change in society. Also A letter from Birmingham Jail was convincing because of the experience, time that was placed into the letter, and the refutes of the criticism he placed in the letter. The clergymen forced their letter upon everyone else, with no thought because they figured that they only had to sign the letter and did not have to prove their credibility because they were white and were part of the social…

    • 1196 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Within the first few paragraphs of King’s Letter from Birmingham Jail establishes his credibility using logos. At the start of the second paragraph King inscribes that the reason he is in Birmingham is due to the influence of “outsiders coming in.” He goes on to state that he isn’t an outsider by saying that he has had the honor to serve as the president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, an organization that operates in every southern state, with the headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia. King goes further by declaring that he is in Birmingham because he has organizational ties there. King refers to himself as a “profit” (1)…

    • 517 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Letter from Birmingham Jail is a letter written by Martin Luther King, Jr. while he was in jail for participating in peaceful protest against segregation. He wrote the letter in response to criticisms made by white clergymen. Dr. King’s goal of this letter was to draw attention to the injustice of segregation, and to defend his tactics for achieving justice. He uses a large number of rhetorical devices in his letter to reach his goal, including point of view, imagery, and rhetorical questions. He uses these rhetorical techniques along with a logical argument to demonstrate why his methods were right.…

    • 1288 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    King uses a type so diction with imagery, and allusion to make his audience think making the impact of the letter linger after they have read it. He uses allusion when he makes a reference to the Bible because it is considered to be holy and truthful, also because it is a reference that most everyone would understand. In the quote “as you seek to explain to your six year old daughter why she can't go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children.”He created a picture of a poor six year old girl’s face and what might have been a mother or father disheartened at the fact that her innocent child will forever have a bitterness towards the white…

    • 603 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    This long complex quote came from the well-known letter of Birmingham jail written by Martin Luther king. Through this letter, he uses a lot of different writing techniques to reach out to his audience. This writing technique has not only made me look at his writing but also feel connected to his writing. He was an American Baptist minister, social activist, humanitarian, and leader in the African-American Civil Rights Movement. He led the Civil Rights Movement in the United States from the mid-1950s until his death by assassination in 1968. He is a strong, well known powerful figure from America’s history.…

    • 449 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    When King uses emotional appeal he is able to manipulate the reader to believe what he wants to believe. It makes the clergymen feel upset and convinced to what he’s saying. “When you ... to explain to your six year old daughter why she can't go to the public amusement park ... and see her tears welled up when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children..” This is a good example of how MLK uses emotional appeal especially because he uses a child as his approach since it is easier to feel sympathy toward a child. He does this to make the reader feel the pain and disappointment colored people and especially children go through.…

    • 567 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    He begins by justifying his presence in Birmingham. He touches on the organizational ties between his Southern Christian Leadership Conference and the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights and the invitation extended to him. This set the stage for the letter’s most power message. Using a court room metaphor he made most effective and frequently use of the logos appeal; particularly in disabusing his audience of the erroneous charge suggested that Dr. King was an outside agitator causing problems with local Blacks and the condescending so called “…unwise and poor timing…” of the Black protests. He used logic and provided substantial evidence to clear him of this charge, with a highly effective closing argument that even if by some slim chance he were deemed an outside…

    • 593 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Blacks are going through a really tough time during this Negro revolution in 1963 and Dr. King accentuates the point by the use of strong diction, which set the tone of the letter. For example, Dr. King elucidates the reason his people can't wait for their rights and that's because " hate-filled policemen curse, kick, brutalize, and even kill" his " black brothers and sisters" and that basically most white people torment them any chance they get. The fact that he brings up physical abuse being brought upon his people should be enough to persuade the clergymen that what he is doing isn't wrong. The tone of the statement leaves a profound impression that his people need equality if they are going to survive in this country. In addition, he exemplifies how segregation affects the life of his people like when a black parent finds his or herself " tongue twisted" and their "speech stammering" when explaining to their tear-filled six-year-old daughter she can't go to an amusement park just advertised on television because she is colored. The fact that a parent can't explain to her daughter she can't attend a public place because of her color, punctures any sensible heart. The fierce example Dr. King uses to depict the painfulness of segregation truly enforces his main point in the letter.…

    • 537 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    The majority of the sentences in King’s letter can be connected to logos, pathos or ethos and his incorporation of appeals is masterful. On more than one occasion, King uses various strategies to appeal to his audience, in the letter he writes, “I have the honor of serving as president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, an organization operating in every southern state, with headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia. We have some eighty-five affiliated organizations across the South, and one of them is the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights.” In this excerpt, King presents his ethos very tactically. The Alabama clergy presents him as an outsider in the letter, but demonstrating his ethos, King presents himself as an insider. He is not just a man who chose to protest in an outside community, but is in fact the president of the Conference. He is a clergyman speaking to other clergymen, but also part of an organization that has a chapter in their state.…

    • 1294 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Jefferson was committing treason, a crime punishable by death, and he was asking his fellow countrymen to do the same. Similarly, King was asking people to follow him in breaking the law, taking the risk of going to jail or tolerating physical and verbal abuse. This, obviously, was not a simple task, but each was profoundly committed to their cause, and they never fell short of giving good reason for their strife. Both Jefferson and King used a significant amount of emotional and logical appeal, not necessarily to make their audience aware of their stance, but to sway them to feel the same and to take action. The style in which the Declaration of Independence was written was very formal and proper, and the emotional appeals are undertone to the logical facts that are stated about the tyrannical King of England. While the statement "He has...sent hither Swarms of Officers to harass our People, and eat out their substance" was most likely meant to strike emotion in the colonists, it was stated in a very particular manner, which gave it a more logical appeal when read by one whom was not living in the colonies at that time. All of the statements made about the King placed strong emphasis on the fact that "HE" was the one responsible for these terrible acts on the colonies, and each statement was precisely constructed to appeal to different audiences in a different way. On the other hand, Dr. King is very direct when using emotional appeal. He used his greeting skillfully to disarm the clergymen who were responsible for his presence in jail, and then, to further build his character in their eyes, he says, "I feel that you are men of genuine good will and that your criticisms are sincerely set forth." As he progresses through the letter and shifts toward different audiences he uses emotional…

    • 997 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    In 1963, strong opinions on black civil rights were being brought forth in Birmingham, Alabama and other southern states. Some of those strong opinions was from 8 clergymen, who spoke out against King and his ideas on desegregation and equality for all. King felt the need to defend his ideas of the men he thought were supportive of the civil rights cause. In King’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail”, he uses rhetorical strategies such as appeals to ethos, logos, and pathos, as well as diction, syntax, allusions and imagery to strengthen his argument that equality for all should be fought for, and segregation should be hindered. These strategies also promote the purpose, which is to correct the misconceptions held by the clergy and to justify the…

    • 1078 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    This letter is very powerful. He makes very good points about our rights. One part that stood out to me was when he spoke on just and unjust laws. He talked a lot about morality and what is really morally right and wrong pertaining to our laws. When he was speaking about unjust laws, I tried to imagine living in such a time like that. Seeing amusement parks on TV but not being able to go, being abused and taunted at school it all seems so farfetched yet it was only fifty years ago. Another one of his main points that stood out to me was when he was talking about negotiation. When I was reading it I was almost finishing his sentences. Of course negotiation is the right path but when the community…

    • 695 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    MLK response

    • 277 Words
    • 2 Pages

    King’s intended rhetorical device to have on the letter’s original audience was to demonstrate the passion and desire he has for what he believes in. By using allusions, balance and parallelism, understatement, and metaphors King reinforces the struggles, aspirations, and justifications in an intelligent way to draw the Clergymen’s attention. King’s elaborate style may get in the way for one who reads his letter without the understanding of his pain and suffering, yet for one who can understand it, it only enhances the letter.…

    • 277 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays