Analyse a text that makes use of rhetoric. Comment on how language is used to persuade the target audience.

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Analyse a text that makes use of rhetoric. Comment on how language is used to persuade the target audience.

"I Have a Dream" is a famous speech that was delivered on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, Washington in August 1963 by one of the most distinguished figures in the history of black civil rights. Martin Luther King is remembered for his considerable involvement in the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 60s. In this period King felt it was his duty to God to promote non-violent protest, and simultaneously repudiate any form of militant action. These views were often manifested in his speeches, of which "I Have a Dream" is the most famous example. In this instance there are numerous rhetoric devices used to persuade the audience of the importance of non-violent protest. I will endeavour to analyse these features and explore how the language was effective for this particular purpose.

"I Have a Dream" is a pre-scripted speech, a piece of writing that was written to be spoken. The mode is therefore somewhere between spoken and written discourse. It is apparent that the speech was pre-scripted through the lack of standard spontaneity features e.g. fillers