The famous Charlie Chaplin speech from The Great Dictator and the speech from The Inglourious Basterds, two speeches that are delivered by two different characters, one a Jewish barber hurled into the position of a dictator, the other, a Jewish American Lieutenant; Delivering the speeches to two different crowds, the barber has a nation, an army, even the world listening to his words, the other addressing his newly formed squad. The question that will be looked upon is not which one of them is the better, but more simply it is about what rhetorical devices they go for and if their is any similarities in them. Very early on in the movie The Inglourious Basterds the character Lt. Aldo Raine addresses the soldiers of his newly formed squad, in the speech he seeks to dehumanize and justify the killing of Nazis. He argues that the Nazis do not have any humanity and that they can not be taught humanity. The speech has a clear pattern to it, he starts …show more content…
Both Chaplain and Lt. Aldo Raine do not address themselves many times in the speech and repeat keywords and phrases throughout their speeches. Lt. Aldo raine tells his squad that they are going to not him, but they are going to bring fear on the Germans, likewise Chaplin pleads to ‘men’, uniting the crowd under one title. The words ‘men’ and ‘we’ are used 16 times and respectively 13 times, both in very short texts. Repetition played the largest part of the rhetorical devices used for Chaplin. Repetition and listing is used by Chaplin in order to convey his views and argument in phrases, such as “Greed has poisoned men’s souls; has barricaded the world with hate; has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed.” and “You, the people, have the power, the power to create machines, the power to create happiness! You, the people, have the power to make this life free and beautiful…” An incredibly strong and indisputable argument is formed this