Moreover, Obama uses pronouns to suggest that a wider group of people helped in the finding of Osama bin laden, like the United States of America. Using these pronouns is effective because it suggests that the American people as one family collectively searched for Osama in their ten years of grief. Obama says, “We offered our neighbours a hand and we offered the wounded our blood. We affirmed our ties to each other and our love of community and country,” the alliteration of ‘we’ and ‘our’ is effective because it emphasises the amount of considerate people who were part of this fundamental investigation and the Americans worked together as one family. Also, in this sentence Obama widens the audience and refers to other countries helping them with their overwhelming loses and Americans helped other countries because they understood the position they were in, as they experienced the same in the 9/11 bombings. Obama extends this audience to show how significant Osama’s death was and how important his murder was, as it is a starting point in the end to terrorism. Also, by widening the audience he builds a connection with other people, as he understands the difficulties they have been through by relating himself to the 9/11 bombings. Obama has used a complex sentence to include everyone and their extensive work to find Osama; this is effective as he is including everyone in one breath, showing the strenuous work of many people and they need to be thanked for. The field specific lexis of ‘love’, ‘offered’ and ‘community’, which all belong to the semantic field of ‘co-operation’, demonstrates that Obama is thankful of the work that many people around the world did and shows a greater sense of unity of the world now that this murderer is dead. Obama says this sentence very slowly, emphasising the amount of people who should be thanked for their work and the audience should have a moment in which to think of these hard-working people and reflect on what they have done. Obama also opens his hands when he says, “we offered our neighbours a hand,” emphasising that the Americans helped many other countries who were in the same situation as them. This sentence is also an informal register, he does this to empathise with the audience and thank them for their lengthy work.
Lastly, there is a difference in word choice between the killings of Osama bin laden and the 9/11 bombings. When Obama talks about killing Osama he says, “The United Sates has conducted a killed Osama bin laden,” and when Obama talks about Osama killing 3000 people in the 9/11 bombings he says, “It came to our shores and started with the senseless slaughter of our citizens.” Obama does this in his speech to imply that the killing of Osama was a right and just act but the way in which he killed thousands of innocent people in the 9/11 bombings was wrong by using the different word choices of ‘killed’ and ‘slaughtered’. Obama uses the word ‘killed’ to describe Osama’s death showing there was no remorse over his death and the audience can tell this through his impartial emotions. However, when he talks about Osama slaughtering many Americans, it sounds like Obama is representing Osama as an animal and 9/11 wasn’t an act in which humans should perform on other humans, suggesting that Osama never had any morals. Also, when Obama talks about Osama slaughtering many of his people he keeps his expressions neutral, as he doesn’t want to attempt to offend anyone or for Osama’s followers who could be listening to get angry and maybe repeat history. However, there is probably some hidden anger inside Obama from a bit of harshness in his voice, but doesn’t portray any anger as this is a solemn topic and wants to keep his expressions neutral for the audience who are watching his speech. Obama uses sibilance, “shores and started with the senseless slaughter,” this is effective as he is emphasising the slaughter of his citizens by using the alliteration of’s’. ‘Senseless slaughter’ suggests that these people were killed for no reason, as they had done nothing wrong to hurt, anger or affect the terrorists or Osama in any way. Also, he is building a rapport with the audience by sympathising with the families with loved ones who have died and explains to them that they didn’t do anything wrong to Osama but it was his fault who selfishly took lives from innocent families. The declarative telling the audience that Osama has died is formal register, however, when he is using imagery to explain how thousands of innocent people were killed in the 9/11 bombings his register changes to informal. This could be because he is being sympathetic to families who have had a loved one dyeing and building a relationship with them but when talking about Osama’s death there is no sympathy as he killed thousands of American innocent people and there is no guilt.
Overall Obama used certain techniques to build a rapport with the audience and for the audience to except that he was also hurt when these 9/11 bombings took place; one example of him doing this is when he changes from a formal to an informal register. Obama also builds his audience to include everyone suggesting that a wider amount of people helped to find Osama and everyone will be affected because of his death. Los, the transcript of Obama’s speech shows that when Obama makes a powerful point about the capturing of Osama’s death the paragraphs seem to be shorter, illustrating that he is telling the audience one fact at a time and doesn’t want the audience to be overloaded with information, as it could get too much and upset some viewers. Lastly, Obama clasps his hands together when talking about the American nation as one, implying that this nation is one family who care, love and look after each other. On the 9/11 bombings this American nation was crushed by the faults of Osama bin Laden and now that this evil man has been brought to justice this American family can live in peace once again.
Miss Khan By: Zarah Lupson 10B
