Compare I Have A Dream And Martin Luther King Speech

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Two of the greatest speeches about freedom for rights were made in the twentieth century. One was “I Have a Dream” by Martin Luther King Junior. It was delivered during the Civil Rights Movement in the United States of America on August 28, 1963. This speech was made at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC. The other speech was “Glory and Hope” by Nelson Mandela. This speech was delivered in Mandela’s inauguration ceremony as the President of South Africa and was telecasted all over the globe, with millions of viewers. Mandela delivered this speech 31 years after Martin Luther King Junior. In this essay, I will examine the similarities and differences between these two indelible speeches, and I will state my opinion on which speech is better. Both speeches were about freedom. Martin Luther King Junior …show more content…

King utters, “This sweltering summer of the Negro’s legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality,” and, ”we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!” This shows that King is vexed by the methods the white community is treating the black people, and is hopeful that they will change in the future, to become united as brothers and sisters. When Mandela delivered his speech, his tone in “Glory and Hope” is of exhilaration and optimism. He says, “Never, never, and never again… experience the oppression of one… suffer indignity of being the junk of the world. The sun shall never set on so glorious a human achievement.” He is joyful that the Apartheid had ended, and is sanguine that South Africa can become a great nation, and prove that they are not outcasts of the world, but rather a