“It’ll be the ballot or it’ll be the bullet. It’ll be liberty or it’ll be death.” These are the famous words of Malcolm X in his speech The Ballot or the Bullet. In April, 1964 Malcolm X stood in front of a large crowd in Cleveland, Ohio and explained what the ballot or bullet meant. He was a leader in the Civil Rights Movement and fought to make all African-Americans equal. Malcolm X explained to his audience using a great appeal to ethos, pathos and logos that African-Americans should fight for racial economic and social justice without different religion views standing in the way. He told his audience instead of fighting, meaning the bullet, they could vote for their own leaders or better leaders to represent them, meaning the ballot. …show more content…
I'm not here to try and change your religion. I'm not here to argue or discuss anything that we differ about, because it's time for us to submerge our differences and realize that it is best for us to first see that we have the same problem, a common problem…
From the beginning of the speech X tells the audience that his religion is Islam and that he is a muslim, but then proceeds to tell his audience that his religious preference has no ill effect on his passion for fighting for equality. Another part of the speech that builds his credibility is when he mentions that the audience and himself have the same problem. In his speech he says “They don’t hang you because you’re because a Baptist, they hang you ‘cause you’re black. They don’t attack me because I’m a Muslim, they attack me ‘cause I’m black.” This builds his credibility because he is relating to his audience over a common problem. The common problem is them being darker complected,or black, and being treated unfairly by lighter skin, or white,
…show more content…
Pathos is the appeal to emotion and Malcolm X uses a lot of pathos in his speech. Before getting into specific lines of his speech that use pathos, Malcolm X has a great usage of pathos by repeating the line “the ballot or the bullet.” This line created a sense of urgency that his audience needed to do something now to create change. He uses this effectively throughout his speech. A specific part of his speech that uses pathos is when he mentions about the march in Washington. He said “He made a chump out of you. He made a fool out of you. He made you think you were going somewhere and you end up going nowhere but between Lincoln and Washington.” This is an example of pathos because of how he spoke this in a way to spark anger in his audience. He is appealing to their anger towards the injustice they faced from the white man. Malcolm X purpose of trying to spark anger is because anger is a way to get someone passionate about an issue and more likely to do something about it. Another specific part of his speech that uses pathos is when he begins saying that African-Americans have never seen democracy. His exact words are “We don’t see the American dream. We see the American nightmare.” Again this is a way to spark anger in his audience over the injustice they have faced. Malcolm X did not believe in violence, his intent was not to get his audience angry and react out in violence, but to vote for future. This is why he
Eugene V. Debs, the United State’s most influential union leader and avid socialist gives light to many issues including presidency, systems of society, and most importantly the unemployed in his speech “The Issue”. Debs was imprisoned in the 1890s for illegally encouraging a railroad strike, he also was sentenced to 10 years for his discouragement to the United States’ involvement in World War I. Debs has been a remarkable figure in the socialist party and had influenced so many. In Eugene Debs’ speech, Debs’ uses rhetorical appeal to relate to and convince his audience of the “issues” in the United
Throughout both letters pathos is used to help shape the reader’s opinion towards the end goal of the author. In Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s letter, he writes about how disappointed he is with the actions of his fellow Americans, comparing it to past events
Additionally, the two men incorporated imagery into their speeches. By instilling vivid descriptions of their visions for the future into their audience, they were able to increase the effectiveness of using pathos and present a clear perspective of their beliefs. Dr. King primarily used imagery metaphorically throughout his speech. Phrases like "lonely island of poverty", "dark and desolate valley of segregation", and "solid rock of brotherhood" emphasized the emotion he's trying evoke from the audience. Malcolm X used descriptive words as well when he said, “The black revolution… is sweeping down upon America like a raging forest fire. It is only a matter of time before America herself will be engulfed by these black flames…” Malcolm's purpose
Often people are not what they seem. According to Roald Dahl, in “Lamb to the Slaughter,” “But there needn’t really be any fuss. I hope not anyway. It wouldn’t be very good for my job.” When in public Patrick Maloney was the doting husband, but when the doors hid outside eyes Patrick revealed his true feelings. He wanted a divorce. He wanted to ruin his wife and soon-to-be child, but without anyone knowing. Thought the passage, the tone is revealed as condescending. The way Mr. Maloney talks to his wife is as though she is a small and unknowing child.
In her unforgettable memoir, Barbara Ehrenreich sets out to explore the lives of the working poor under the proposed welfare reforms in her hometown, Key West, Florida. Temporarily discarding her middle class status, she resides in a small cheap cabin located in a swampy background that is forty-five minutes from work, dines at fast food restaurants, and searches all over the city for a job. This heart-wrenching yet infuriating account of hers reveals the struggles that the low-income workers have to face just to survive. In the except from Nickel and Dimed, Ehrenreich uses many rhetorical strategies to illustrate the conditions of the low wage workers including personal anecdotes of humiliation at interviews, lists of restrictions due to limited
Politics is dirty and competitive and has not changed between 1879 and 2018. It is a complex system of jargon, charm, facts, and lies. Mark Twain’s “The Presidential Candidate” satirically expresses the essence of both old-world and modern politics as a presidential candidate who blatantly tells the truth of his wrongdoings. As a politician, one must be an open book. Their life must be truthfully written on the pages for the readers to analyze and evaluate their credibility as leaders. “The Presidential Candidate” resonates both in 1879 and 2018 with his use of humor, use of diction and use of subtlety.
Rhetorical Analysis of Artifacts: The Ballot or the Bullet? Speech Given by Malcolm X I. Introduction: Though almost half a century has passed, the Civil War. The Rights Movement remains one freshly imprinted in not only the history. books of US schools, but also in the minds of countless Americans.
In his speech, “The Ballot or the Bullet,” Malcolm X’s tone is objective, yet motivating and optimistic, as he describes the theory of black nationalism, which he thinks all blacks must embrace in order to unite as a community under a single goal, to achieve equality. Through the use of factual evidence, schemes, and personal pronouns, Malcolm X builds on his ethos as he makes himself a more credible, trustworthy speaker about the dire situation of blacks. In the beginning of the speech, Malcolm X builds a personal profile of himself, as he mentions that he is a Muslim. However, after doing so, he disregards religion, claiming it does not matter. He states, “Whether we are Christians or Muslims or nationalists or agnostics, or atheists, we must first learn to forget our differences.” His authoritative and didactic tone here contributes to his ethos as it makes him sound credible.
When giving his speech “The Ballot or the Bullet” Malcolm X spoke in a content and tone that made this speech very impactful to his audience and listeners which is still relevant today. Malcolm X was convinced that voting was the way to change racial prejudice in America. The Ballot or the Bullet is directed at African Americans and encourages them to stand up for their rights at all cost. He spoke with such knowledge, attitude and passion that put emphasis on the importance of African Americans being educated and educating themselves on politics. Malcolm X was a prominent spokesman of the civil rights era, his words when spoken were very potent and influential especially in the black community. Because Malcolm X was very direct in his speech, the audience responded positively and respectfully. “It 's time for
Speeches are a method of persuading people to do something. For Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X, their speeches were to bring equality for the people of color. However, their approaches are different. Consequently, the effects may be different. An example of their contrasting differences is a speech from each, King’s “I Have a Dream” and X’s “The Black Revolution”. Their speeches used pathos, a central metaphor, and a warning, but was presented differently.
...ack Nationalism to coexistence. He pointed out how America can live without racial problems that it had since slavery. This was a road trip for Malcolm X from the Nation of Islam which used the name of Islam to promote its own social and political agenda to that of true Islam, which allows Malcolm X to see an alternative approach towards his objectives.. George Breitman in his book “The Last Year of Malcolm X” states “…if they adopt Malcolm’s strategy, accept his legacy and develop it n accord with the logic of the direction in which he was moving during his last year, then all of America will be transformed…” Reading the Ballot or the Bullet after knowing this will make one think beyond the actual words that are mentioned in the speech. Today, because of his boldness, Malcolm X is viewed by many, alongside Martin Luther King Jr., as a great civil rights leader.
Malcolm X stumbled upon some of his letters that put the idea in his head to give himself a homemade education. As he tried he became frustrated because he could not express what he wanted to convey what was in the letters. Malcolm X states, “I had been the most articulate hustler out there...But now, trying to write simple English, I not only wasn’t articulate, I wasn’t even functional”(X 189). Malcolm uses ethos in this quote by showing his credibility and by associating himself into the quote. He explains that even though he was a big hustler on the streets, simple english did not make any sense to him. He even stated that he was not functional because nothing made sense to him. He tried many different things to help him understand what the world was and what he could never understand before. Now that we have seen how Malcolm incorporated Ethos, let us see how he used Pathos to describe his
King uses in his speech is Pathos, which is the appeal to someone 's emotions or beliefs. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. presented a strong feeling towards African-American people about how they were treated as equal individuals “But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination” (King par. 3). Another example of pathos that Dr. King used was when he uses vocabulary and phrases, such as “I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream” (King par. 12). He uses the appeal of emotion, especially the word of choice and diction to let his audience’s know what he would like to see in the
Propaganda is characterized as data which is false or which underscores only one piece of a circumstance, utilized by an administration or political gathering to make individuals concur with them as. Although Malcolm X was saying the right thing, he only used the one side evidence to push his claims such as the violence aspect. For example, “If George Washington didn’t get independence for this country nonviolently, and if Patrick Henry didn’t come up with a nonviolent statement, and you taught me to look upon them as patriots and heroes, then it’s time for you to realize that I have studied your books well.” He made his audience aware that freedom is not given freely but through violence one can obtain freedom. Throughout his speech, he uses name calling to push his claims. Malcolm X then was referring to some of the blacks who did not support his movement with names such as “Uncle Tom” to provoke his audiences, which were some blacks who supported, agreed with him for
As one of the most proficient civil rights activist of the 1960's, Malcolm X and his speeches were very influential but particularly one speech was highly esteemed, that being the Ballot or the Bullet speech. A speech that was given after the "I have A Dream speech by Dr. Martin Luther King. Despite, Dr. Martin Luther King being a pacifist and also a civil rights activist as well; Malcolm X was more tyrannical and advocated the use of violence. During this era, the democrats were in control of the House of Representatives and the Senate, therefore both the Senate and the House of Representatives were leaning towards providing more civil rights to African-Americans. The purpose of Malcolm X’s speech was to convince African Americans to become more politically aware and to vote members of their own race into office.