remembermo
Jan 20, 2009
Writing Feedback / A Letter from Birmingham Jail (loaded words effectiveness) [5]
This is just a paper im doing for an english course. im absolutely horrible at writing papers. so constructive criticism is most wanted :)
Martin Luther King's Usage of Persuasive Loaded Words
Through loaded words Martin Luther King Jr. was able to connect emotionally as well as to relate to his audience in a "Letter from Birmingham Jail". Throughout the letter, King uses several different ways of emotional and logical persuasion when speaking to his audience, loaded words, being one. Loaded words have strong connotations which evoke either negative or positive emotions that usually go beyond a definition found in a dictionary. In addition, they often help provide imagery and make connections for the reader hence King was able to relate and connect emotionally to his audience.
By using loaded words King could reach his audience, clergymen of Alabama, emotionally through the word's connotations. Such can be seen at his periodic paragraph, "But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse, kick and even kill your black brothers and sisters." (para. 15) The following, vicious, hate-filled, curse, kick, and kill, are all loaded words with immediate strong negative connotations. He also uses repetition of loaded words to attract the focus to specifically those words and blend the text around it creating a lengthy list. "All segregation statutes are unjust because segregation distorts the soul and damages the personality. It gives the segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false sense of inferiority. Segregation, to use the terminology of the Jewish philosopher Martin Buber, substitutes an "I-it" relationship for an "I-thou" relationship and ends up relegating persons to the status of things. Hence segregation is not only politically, economically and sociologically unsound, it is morally wrong and awful." (para. 17) Segregation is clearly made the loaded word and is repeated with force. Loaded words with negative connotations also surround "segregation" which establishes an even stronger overall negative view. Overall negative views also include the following text, "As in so many past experiences, our hopes had been blasted, and the shadow of deep disappointment settled upon us." (para. 8) Blasted, shadow, deep, and disappointment are also loaded words with negative connotations and therefore reflect a negative overview successfully allowing King to connect with his audience emotionally.
Relating to his audience is just as important as joining them at an emotional level. In order to get the point's he wants across he needs to allow the Clergy to see the similarities rather than differences, by once again using loaded words. The King is able to relate through children and the experiences of being a parent such as, "when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering 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, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing an unconscious bitterness toward white people." (para. 15) Loaded words here include; daughter, park, tears, Funtown, children, little, distort, and white. This is both emotionally connecting with the clergymen as well as relating to them, by introducing family issues. It demonstrates how black children of the time were unable to go to some amusement parks and the King allows the audience to view how he feels as a parent seeing as how they could relate. The word "children" carries with it usually a connotation of innocence, here; King uses children as victims with a naive portrayal.
This is just a paper im doing for an english course. im absolutely horrible at writing papers. so constructive criticism is most wanted :)
Martin Luther King's Usage of Persuasive Loaded Words
Through loaded words Martin Luther King Jr. was able to connect emotionally as well as to relate to his audience in a "Letter from Birmingham Jail". Throughout the letter, King uses several different ways of emotional and logical persuasion when speaking to his audience, loaded words, being one. Loaded words have strong connotations which evoke either negative or positive emotions that usually go beyond a definition found in a dictionary. In addition, they often help provide imagery and make connections for the reader hence King was able to relate and connect emotionally to his audience.
By using loaded words King could reach his audience, clergymen of Alabama, emotionally through the word's connotations. Such can be seen at his periodic paragraph, "But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse, kick and even kill your black brothers and sisters." (para. 15) The following, vicious, hate-filled, curse, kick, and kill, are all loaded words with immediate strong negative connotations. He also uses repetition of loaded words to attract the focus to specifically those words and blend the text around it creating a lengthy list. "All segregation statutes are unjust because segregation distorts the soul and damages the personality. It gives the segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false sense of inferiority. Segregation, to use the terminology of the Jewish philosopher Martin Buber, substitutes an "I-it" relationship for an "I-thou" relationship and ends up relegating persons to the status of things. Hence segregation is not only politically, economically and sociologically unsound, it is morally wrong and awful." (para. 17) Segregation is clearly made the loaded word and is repeated with force. Loaded words with negative connotations also surround "segregation" which establishes an even stronger overall negative view. Overall negative views also include the following text, "As in so many past experiences, our hopes had been blasted, and the shadow of deep disappointment settled upon us." (para. 8) Blasted, shadow, deep, and disappointment are also loaded words with negative connotations and therefore reflect a negative overview successfully allowing King to connect with his audience emotionally.
Relating to his audience is just as important as joining them at an emotional level. In order to get the point's he wants across he needs to allow the Clergy to see the similarities rather than differences, by once again using loaded words. The King is able to relate through children and the experiences of being a parent such as, "when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering 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, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing an unconscious bitterness toward white people." (para. 15) Loaded words here include; daughter, park, tears, Funtown, children, little, distort, and white. This is both emotionally connecting with the clergymen as well as relating to them, by introducing family issues. It demonstrates how black children of the time were unable to go to some amusement parks and the King allows the audience to view how he feels as a parent seeing as how they could relate. The word "children" carries with it usually a connotation of innocence, here; King uses children as victims with a naive portrayal.