Rhetorical Analysis Of Mlk Letter To Birmingham Jail

As a peacemaker and an outspoken leader, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. has done a lot to end segregation in the United States of America. His own imagination filled with millions of hopes that one day everyone can learn to accept one another put him in very difficult situations in which he was not afraid. In 1963, Dr. King wrote a letter from the Birmingham Jail to a clergymen that freedom has to be given to everyone no matter what race they were. Dr. King fought for the rights of African Americans because they were separated from doing all the things that the Whites were able to do. He decided to take a step and fight for everyone. As we all know, ending segregation wasn’t a task that could be resolved in just a matter of minutes because many

King. He went all the way to Birmingham to make peace because there was injustice going on for everyone. When Dr. King talks about him going all the way to Birmingham to make peace, he mentions another time period. One of the rhetorical devices used allusion. Dr. King mentions, “Just as the prophets of the eighth century B.C. left their villages and carried their “thus saint the Lord” far beyond the boundaries of their home towns,” to emphasize on how much it meant for him to go all the way to another state to negotiate peace. He relates his own situation to another time period because it would make him seem as someone who cared about everyone. Dr. King did his best to convince the clergymen because he knew if he had convinced him, he would have a better opportunity to connect with the rest. One of his main motives was to let others know how much being a leader meant to

King. Most people had an idealistic way of living and didn’t seem to care much about the injustice that was occurring. Dr. King used ethos, pathos, and logos in his letter to make his letter look appealing to those who didn’t care or to at least inform them about the consequences colored people had to face while they sat idly. He uses ethos when he’s explaining what it takes to fight for one’s owns rights. He wanted the clergymen to realize that no matter what it took, he would always support equality even if it meant cruel consequences at the end. Dr. King uses pathos when he says, “But when you have seen victims mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse, kick, brutalize, and even kill your black brothers and sisters with impunity,” to describe how hurtful these things were. Dr. King had to take a step forward because brutalizing someone when they have done nothing at all is wrong. He uses logos when he talks about segregation as an unnecessary