Rhetorical Analysis Of Richard Nixon's Speech

Former President Richard Nixon’s speech was decent, but not exceptional. He attempted to use an outline and be positive but it did not work out very well. He used some important speech skills, but forgot about others and used a few bad habits. Nixon attempted to keep his speech positive while following an outline, but some of it did not work very well. He began by addressing his colleagues, guests and fellow americans which worked well because then everyone feels included. He spoke about what he was going to do and not going to do and explained why so people would have faith in his actions such as not presenting proposals that have no chance of passing and instead presenting vital programs that could actually be enacted. To keep it positive he spoke of the progress since the events of the 1960’s, some of what he said included: “Our cities are no longer engulfed by civil disorders. Our colleges and universities have again become places of learning instead of battlegrounds.” and “A beginning has been

He responded to the audience by pausing for their applause instead of attempting to speak over them. He used simple words to convey maximum understanding by the audience. He also quoted former presidents to draw attention to how things have changed since their times. When accenting certain points he used a stronger voice. Some of these points were about people joining together for the national interest, and building a generation of peace. To keep the mood lite he made some jokes, but in his voice it did not sound like a joke even though his words made it a joke. This would be because he read a lot which resulted in him stumbling over his words sometimes. At one point he says “look at this chamber” and does look around but besides that he uses an extremely minimal amount of gestures to accent what he is speaking about. Overall this resulted with a rather boring