Current event Analyses Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Current event Analyses - Essay Example He gave us several benchmarks by which to judge writing or speech. I shall use those devices to analyze the recent speech by President Obama after the Boston terror attacks. Terrorism is a problem of huge magnitude globally. With the killing of Osama bin Laden, the President had earlier on reassured the nation that terrorism will be a thing of the past. However, an attack of the most elementary kind happened and several people lost their lives. Therefore, it is important to see how the president, who is well known for his good oratory skills, used this attribute to reassure the nation again. Apart from analyzing the elements of oratory that the President employed, there shall also be a focus on the effectiveness of the speech. One of the most important parts of rhetoric that should never be ignored is the setting. Usually in rhetorical analysis, there is a focus on the text, choice of words and even delivery, however; minimal attention is given to the setting. The setting was very im portant in this case because of two main reasons. One of the reasons is that the President chose to deliver his speech on the attacks in the town where the attacks took place. This is important because he gets to connect emotionally with the people who are affected by the killings. He could have chosen to deliver the speech from the White House, an equally important place, but far removed from the tragedy at hand (â€Å"Boston Marathon Bombing: Mystery Remains over Motive†). Another notable aspect about the President’s chosen setting is that it was a church. This was a time when the nation’s faith in the ability of government to fully protect them against any harm had been shaken. That faith needed to be strengthened and the best place to do that was at the church. The atmosphere was also better attuned to the humility that Americans had been subjected to by this event. We all know Americans as people who have an overly optimistic sense of their own abilities. T he ability to stop criminal attacks was wounded by this attacks and humility was necessary to try and better come to terms with the fact that terrorism is advancing, just as government’s military capabilities improve (Crocker 34). There are three kinds of appeals that we have come to associate with rhetoric. These appeals are to the pathos, the logos and to ethos (Pass 56). All these are certainly detectable in the President’s speech and they shall form the basis of my analysis of this speech. The appeal to the pathetic is the appeal to the emotions. The appeal to the logic and ethics are as straightforward as they sound (Genung 45). The most outstanding device that the President uses in this speech is metaphor. This is a device that runs throughout the President’s speech. The President begins by invoking scripture readings. This was a church service after all, so in a way it was expected. However, he takes it a little further than normal. He says that scripture tells us to â€Å"run with endurance the race that is set before us.† This is a statement that connects with the tragedy at hand in more ways than one. First of all it is important to remember that the attacks that necessitated this speech were targeted at runners in one of the most famous races, the Boston Marathon. This is an annual race that attracts participants from across the world. Likening the marathon to our ‘race in life’ is a strong way of trying to assure the people that life must go on after this gruesome event. The President extends that metaphor on and on