Memorable Speeches

Paper Summary:

This paper begins by comparing speeches by civil rights activists Martin Luther King, Jr ("I Have a Dream") and Malcolm X ("The Ballot or the Bullet"). It explains and compares the differences in tones, use of imagery and other techniques which made these two speeches so memorable. The paper then analyzes "Dying To Be Thin" by Jennifer Breuer to give an example of a speech which is more clinical and informative in nature. Women's rights activist, Elizabeth Cady Stanton's speech "The Declaration of Sentiments", given at the 1848 Seneca Falls Conference is then discussed as an example of a combination of learning, education, experience, eloquence and passion.

From the Paper:

"With this shift in language, and thus shift in perspective, Stanton makes a radical statement about the equality of women to men in the public sphere. This was something that most Americans in the middle of the 19th century did not believe (or had not considered). To be an effective advocate for her cause, Stanton had both to reveal and to conceal the truly radical nature of her ideas. By phrasing her analysis of women's rights in terms of the Declaration of Independence, Stanton was (implicitly) arguing that what she was arguing for was not radical, was simply a natural and even necessary extension of the rights of all and any Americans that the Revolutionary War had been fought to gain. But, by phrasing her analysis of women's rights in terms of the Declaration of Independence, Stanton was also (implicitly) arguing that her demands were as radical and as morally right as those demands made by the colonists to King George."

More papers on Memorable Speeches:

• Analytical Essay # 124075 : "The Gettysburg Address"
• Analytical Essay # 143187 : "Barack Obama's Inaugural Address"
• Essay # 54376 : "The Shawshank Redemption"

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