Martin Luther King's Use Of Pathos In An Advertisement

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Pathos in an Advertisement Almost everywhere, on t.v channels., on the Internet, in the folded sheets of a newspaper, an advertisement will appear. Advertisements are one way for a company, speaker, or a person to reach out to a particular audience to get a message across. The messages that are trying to be relayed to the audience can range from a huge issue of trying to change somebody’s belief about a certain issue, to something smaller such as trying to get somebody to get out of their comfort zone and eat something new for lunch. However, in order to get a person to stop what they’re doing and focus in on the message that’s trying to be conveyed, the person needs to relate to their specified audience. Sometimes, the best way for a message …show more content…

Majority of the decisions we make on a daily basis are based on our emotions at that particular time. Pathos goes along with ethos and logos when wanting to think about how to craft an argument. You need all three in order to have the right balance. Pathos is used in anecdotes or other narratives, images or other forms of media, direct quotations, and humor (Gayle). For instance, in the famous “I Have a Dream Speech” by Martin Luther King Jr., one of the ways it was so emotionally appealing was through his use of pathos. Dr. King utilizes pathos by relating his speech to his own dreams and family. In his speech he said, “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.” This quote in particular brought tears to many members of the audience. Making the speech personal and bringing in his own family was able to help establish a relationship between Dr. King and the people around him. This is just one way that pathos is expressed to an audience and it worked because of the way the audience reacted (Manfredonia). Advertisements in particular contain a lot of pathos because it is a picture. Emotional appeals can’t be heard, in comparison to a speech or