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impact of 9/11 attacks
the political impact of 9/11
the political impact of 9/11
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The Language of Terrorism
On September 11, 2001, two airplanes flew into the World Trade Center and another into the Pentagon, while yet another suspiciously crashed. Blasted on T.V. screens across America, were images of fire, destruction, chaos and death. Framed in colors of red, white and blue, were such headlines that read: ³America Under-Attack,² ³The War Against Terror² and ³The Attack on America²; all the while, urgent ticket taped messages flowed across our television screens and news anchors reported on the utmost of news. To sum-up the days events, President Bush addressed the nation.
It was in the President¹s initial speech to the nation following the attack on the World Trade Center that the adjective ³evil² was first introduced. Quoting from the bible, and making reference to a ³power greater than any of us,² the President reassured the American people of their safety and well-being. Within a couple of minutes, the stage was set for all that was to follow.
Since adopted by the media, the Bush administration and the American people, the religious reference of ³evil² by the President has become an integral part of the public discourse. Framing the way we talk and think about the day¹s events, and all subsequent events, including talk of Bin Laden, the Taliban and terrorism, the use of binary language in religious and metaphoric expression have become an important element in the ³war against terrorism.² And despite the President¹s and congress¹ denouncement of any reference to ³the attack on terrorism² as a holy war, it seems as if the American ideal of ³separation of state and religion,² has become suspended and/or forgotten all together.
The intent of this paper is to analysis the language used by the President to describe the September 11th events, and consequentially, its binary effects. Given the President¹s religious and metaphoric references a dichotomous framework is thought to exit. For instance, in using the term ³evil,² images of the devil and hell have been conjured up --and conversely-- images of God and heaven. Helping to demonize those responsible, the initial language used by the President and later incorporated by the press, has since served as a political weapon from which to fight ³the war against terrorism.² In that the President¹s speech evoked from his audience (most notably the American people) feelings of fear, terror, anger, and hatred, the appeal has been to the public¹s emotions and senses rather than their ration and intellect.
The day was September 11th, 2001, a moment in history that will never be forgotten by any American living at the time. It was in the early morning hours on this day that our nation experienced the single most devastating terrorist attack ever carried out on American soil. Images of planes crashing into the World Trade Center, news coverage of buildings on fire, and images of building rubble will forever be imprinted into the history of this great nation. However, it was on one of the darkest days for America that one of the most impassioned speeches ever given by a United States president was spoken. President George W. Bush’s speech addressing the nation after the “9/11” attacks was infused with pathos through his imagery of destruction and
Since the 9/11 attacks, the Bush administration has been calling every citizens and every nations to support his Middle East policy. Nonetheless, the U.S. has been involved in the middle-east struggle for more than half of the century, wars were waged and citizens were killed. Yet, political struggles and ideological conflicts are now worse than they were under Clinton’s presidency. As “President’s Address to the Nation” is a speech asking everybody to support the troops to keep fighting in Iraq, I, as an audience, am not persuaded at all because of his illogical fallacy in the arguments. In this essay, I will analyze how and what are the illogical fallacies he uses in the speech.
September 11, 2001, is a day that will go down in history and never be forgotten. On this day in time, Islamic terrorists attacked the World Trade Center in New York City, as well as The Pentagon building in Washington, D.C. The terrorists, who were affiliated with Al Qaeda, were led by the one and only, Osama Bin Laden. Nine days after this devastating attack on our country, President George W. Bush addressed Congress with an unplanned State of the Union address. Bush used great amounts of tragedy with a direct vital tone to deliver a very important message. Ultimately, this message would reach out to the American people as a whole, not only for remembrance of the people who lost their lives, but also as a plan of action for what would lie ahead.
September 11th was a dark and stormy Tuesday where the lives of people became the cost of revenge. Many innocent people faced their Tuesday morning by ending their lives instantly, as a high jacked plane plummeted from the sky, towards their office building. At 8:45 am a high jacked passenger jet, flight 11 of American Airlines, plunges into the North tower of The World Trade Center. 9:03 am another plane hit this time the South tower. Leaving both buildings ablaze in flames of deat...
In May 2003, President George W. Bush addressed the nation and announced an end to major combat operations in Iraq which resulted in the death of Saddam Hussein. His message touched on many issues in the ongoing war on terrorism but most importantly, it conveyed the fact that the United States would not tolerate the killing of innocent people. The President began by expressing gratitude to the men and women who have sacrificed for their country. He then proceeded to inform the American people of the work that had been accomplished in Iraq, Afghanistan, and neighboring countries since the declaration of war, all while substantiating the need for ongoing military presence in the Middle East. In addition to informing the nation, he attempted to ensure the safety of the American people and warn those with intentions to harm Americans or their allies.
President George W. Bush is notorious for horrible public speaking, tripping over his words and making silly mistakes are not uncommon in President Bush’s speeches. When 9/11 struck the heart of America we turned to President Bush to guide us back to the path of calm and reason. The American population tends to lean on our President in time of tragedy to serve as a system of support. Instantly after the World Trade Center buildings were attacked President Bush addressed the nation on live television. Bush used neo-Aristotelian tactics: ethos, pathos, and logos to instate a sense of patriotism, argue that America will recover from this tragedy and bring justice to our nation.
For a second, the U.S. stood still. Looking up at the towers, one can only imagine the calm before the storm in the moment when thousands of pounds of steel went hurdling into its once smooth, glassy frame. People ran around screaming and rubble fell as the massive metal structure folded in on itself like an accordion. Wounded and limping from the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center, America carried on, not without anger and fear against a group of innocent Americans, Muslim Americans. Nietzsche’s error of imaginary cause is present in the treatment of Muslim Americans since 9/11 through prejudice in the media, disregard of Muslim civil liberties, racial profiling, violence, disrespect, and the lack of truthful public information about Islam. In this case, the imaginary cause against Muslims is terrorism. The wound has healed in the heart of the U.S. but the aching throb of terrorism continues to distress citizens every day.
The transformation of America is often discussed in both popular media and academic dialogue. Each generation has a name, new technologies define new eras, and events seem only notable when they are “historic”. While major events catch the interest of a broad spectrum of the public consciousness, subtle interactions between actors and slight shifts in beliefs are constantly changing the realities of the world. When the twin towers fell in 2001, the United States seemed to be thrust into a new world of Weapons of Mass Destruction, Jihadists, and a global fight against terrorism; bombs were dropped, ground forces were deployed in foreign states, and anyone who publicly questioned the urgency of war was at risk to be labeled a traitor. This one event was indelibly branded on the consciousness of the world and if often seen as a moment of sudden transformation. Most Americans believe that the troop presence in Iraq and Afghanistan are due to the terrorist attacks on the United States and while it is hard to deny that the 9-11 attacks was the impetus for putting boots on the ground, it is imperative that the chain of events following the horror of September 11 are seen to reflect the willingness and wants of actors in control before the towers fell.
September 11, 2001 will always be referred to as one of the darkest days in American history. It was a day that sent the entire nation into chaos, grief, and anger. Following the events of 9/11, former President, George Bush addressed the nation in the Oval Office at the White House in an effort to restore a fallen nation. Although I was just 6 at the time, I do remember sitting in front of the T.V. and watching President Bush’s address the nation and reassuring me that I was safe and that everything would eventually return to normal.
On the brink of two different wars, two United States’ Presidents rose up to the challenge of calming the American people and fighting for the belief of justice. A day after devastation on December 7, 1941, Franklin D. Roosevelt gives his “Pearl Harbor Address to the Nation”. At the beginning of a terrorist crisis in 2001, George W. Bush announces a “‘War on Terror’ Declaration”. Both Presidents have many similarities in common, yet their differences set them apart with uniqueness. These two speeches, separate by nearly sixty years, weave an outright and assertive tone into their diction and detail.
43rd President of the United States, George Bush, in his speech, “9/11 Address to the Nation” addresses the nation about the day of September 11, 2001. Bush’s purpose is to convey the events of September 11, 2001 and what was and will be done about them. He adopts a serious yet somber tone in order to appeal to the strong and emotional side of the public and to his listeners around the world.
Host: On September the 11th 2001, the notorious terror organisation known as Al-Qaeda struck at the very heart of the United States. The death count was approximately 3,000; a nation was left in panic. To this day, counterterrorism experts and historians alike regard the event surrounding 9/11 as a turning point in US foreign relations. Outraged and fearful of radical terrorism from the middle-east, President Bush declared that in 2001 that it was a matter of freedoms; that “our very freedom has come under attack”. In his eyes, America was simply targeted because of its democratic and western values (CNN News, 2001). In the 14 years following this pivotal declaration, an aggressive, pre-emptive approach to terrorism replaced the traditional
Throughout the nation catastrophes occur on a daily basis; however there are a few catastrophes that have taken national precedence and left a traumatized nation. Most usually these catastrophes are an act of terrorism. Michael Nelson (2010) describes the nature of such terrorism catastrophes as disconcerting, unanticipated and that unnerve “the country’s sense of safety and identity” (p. 20). When such “a traumatic event results in the death of civilians” and “calls the nation’s institutions or values into question” the nation as a whole looks to their leader, our president, to offer solace and calm through a responsive speech (Campbell and Jamieson, 2008, p. 102). In Presidents Creating the Presidency, (2008) the authors have labeled these speeches as a national eulogy in which they usually occur at the sight of the
Historical Significance: The September 11th, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, orchestrated by Al-Qaeda and Bin Laden, were the events that launched the U.S. War on Terrorism. Al-Qaeda’s attack on the United States was carried out by members of radicalized Islamic groups, whose objective was to spread jihad against the secular influence of the West. This tragic event provided the historical b...
On September 11, 2001, the destruction of the World Trade Center and the Pentagon changed the mindset and the opinion of nearly every American on the one of the most vital issues in the 21st century: terrorism (Hoffman 2). Before one can begin to analyze how the United States should combat such a perverse method of political change, one must first begin to understand what terrorism is, where it is derived from, and why there is terrorism. These issues are essential in America’s analysis of this phenomenon that has revolutionized its foreign policy and changed America’s stance in the world.