we had to do an analyisis speech for public speaking. i thought i would analyze fdr's speech, the arsenal of democracy. i thought it would be easy to find criticisms on the speech. i thought i would have it easy. fdr is very famous. his arsenal of democracy speech was very famous.
i spent six quality hours with google today trying to find criticism on my speech. but i got the speech written. it is not completely done right now, but here it is in essence.
i have a wonderful sister who is on campus and spent time, time she should have been working on two different projects she has due, looking for different books on fdr's stylistic literary devices in this speech. she found some, bless her heart. what a wonderful sister. so here is the speech folks. criticism (constructive criticism please) would be nice.
America: The Arsenal of Democracy
A radio address delivered on December 29th, 1940
“FDR spoke a language of inclusion and inspiration. Phrases like ‘a day that will live in infamy,’ ‘We have nothing to fear but fear itself,’ and ‘the arsenal of democracy,’ have entered our common language, and their potency, both in memory and in lasting power, keeps them from becoming empty cliches” says author Victor Kamber. In several of his speeches FDR used many different stylistic devices in order to better connect with the general middle class population of the United States. In analyzing FDR’s Arsenal of Democracy speech I want us as students to see how effective the use stylistic language devices was to help connect with America, a nation on the brink of war.
On December 27th, 1940 the world watched as the three main Axis powers, Italy, Germany, and Japan signed an Anti-USA pact that “joined themselves together in the threat that if the United States interfered with or blocked the expansion program of these three nations—a program aimed at world control—they would unite in ultimate action against the United States;” FDR said in his Arsenal of Democracy speech two days later. In this speech FDR urges the Nation to be strong as they were previously in the Great Depression. “We met the issue of 1933 with courage and realism. We face this new crisis—this new threat to the security of our Nation—with the same courage and realism.” Another purpose of this speech was to urge the United States to use their resources to help Britain in producing war munitions. “I want to make it clear that it is the purpose of the Nation to build now with all possible speed every machine and arsenal and factory that we need to manufacture our defense material. We have the men, the skill, the wealth, and above all, the will.”
Toward the beginning of his speech FDR makes an analogy about the German nation. “It is no exaggeration to say that all of us in the Americas would be living at the point of a gun—a gun loaded with explosive bullets, economic as well as military.” He again refers to Germany in the same sense later on in the speech in reference to other nations that have given into the German lies and deceit and were now living at their mercy. “The fate of these nations tells us what it means to live at the point of a Nazi gun.” FDR is using this type of analogy to show America just how dangerous it would be to subject themselves to the Nazi regime. He again uses the analogy tactic in describing Great Britain: “In a military sense Great Britain and the British Empire are today the spearhead of resistance to world conquest. They are putting up a fight which will live forever in the story of human gallantry.”
But the analogy is not by far the only stylistic language device that FDR used in this speech. He also makes use of assonance and consonance to make a more poetic sound to his words. For example “There are also American citizens, many of them in high places, who unwittingly in most cases, are aiding and abetting the work of these agents.” And “Non-intervention pact or not, the fact remains that they were attacked, overrun, and thrown into the modern form of slavery at an hour’s notice or even without any notice at all.” Pact, fact, attacked. And in the previous quote: places and cases. He also in the last quote uses alliteration, the same initial sound in the words, aiding, abetting, and agents.
Another tactic that FDR used in his speech is personification or more specifically prosopopeia. Prosopopeia, where an animate object or an abstract concept is spoken of as though it were endowed with life or with human attributes or feelings, is a narrower term within the concept of personification. FDR uses this directly when he states “They (meaning the evil forces or the Axis powers) try to reawaken long slumbering racial and religious enmities which should have no place in this country.” Racial and religious enmities, both abstract concepts being endowed with reawakening, a human attribute.
The metaphor is another device that FDR uses in this speech and perhaps the most obvious. Again FDR is speaking of Germany and says “The experience of the past two years has proven beyond doubt that no nation can appease the Nazis. No man can tame a tiger into a kitten by stroking it. There can be no appeasement with ruthlessness. There can be no reasoning with an incendiary bomb.” He uses here something that the American people are very used to and probably have experienced. Taming a kitten and then broadening it to a tiger and finally into an incendiary bomb.
Throughout his Arsenal of Democracy speech, FDR used several different types of stylistic language devices. He relayed the danger of the situation the United States found itself in by using analogies, he used assonance and consonance to make the rhythm of the speech flow, and finally he used the metaphor so the general populous of America could relate. We as students can use this speech as an example to help us incorporate these methods into our speeches to make us more effective speakers. Thank you.
who was he?
he began to plagiarize at the age of 15. he was named michael king and died under that name. so in essence he never legally changed his name. he plagiarised his doctoral thesis and many of his speeches. he plagiarised his most famous speech, "i have a dream." so why do we celebrate his day? why is he the only person to get their own holiday. not even george washington has his own day.
one guy in our class said that we can't relate to martin luther king jr. day or the civil rights movement because he was white. is that the issue here? or is it because our generation is removed from that. my mother remembers segregation in elementary school. she can relate to the issue more i guess.
so what should our views be on the day?
for the help on the subtitle. the wookie hacked into my moveable type thing and added the weblog configuration option to my manage section. i then was able to go into it and add a subtitle and then go to the style sheet section of the templates and change the color.
i couldn't have done it w/o you all!
how would i add a subtitle to my blog? i want to write in a subtitle under the title whatnot. like on steph's and ben's etc. any and all comments/suggestions/snide remarks would be welcome and accepted.
i hadn't thought to use this as a means for getting prayer requests out, but here it goes.
i have a semi-urgent request. i don't know how many are acquainted with my health history but the short of it is this past summer my doctor ordered an ultrasound and a CAT scan on my thyroid because of some symptoms i was experiencing. the tests showed a lump or a nodule on my right thyroid. it could be cancerous or it could be a hyper-thyroid.
here is the request, since we have moved, i no longer have that doctor and have to find another to go thru a radio-active iodine test that takes a while. so it seems as if it would be a long process. i have been praying about working at the Wilds of the Rockies this summer, and very much wish to. pray that:
1. we find a doctor quickly.
2. that the results would be good.
3. that the Lord's will would be worked in this situation for the summer.
thank you all.
The fascination of shooting as a sport depends almost wholly on whether you are at the right or wrong end of the gun.
P. G. Wodehouse
people should be able to tell from my life, my actions, my reactions and my attitude that God is King of my life. seeing me and thinking automaticaly that He orders my life and all i do is driven my love and respect for Him.
"the man who comes to a right belief about God is relieved of ten thousand temporal problems, for he sees at once that these have to do with matters which at the most cannot concern him for very long; but even if the multiple burdens of time may be lifted from him, the one mighty single burden of eternity begins to press down upon him with a weight more crushing than all the woes of the world piled one upon another. that mighty burden is his obligation to God. it includes an instant and lifelong duty to love God with every power of mind and soul, to obey him perfectly, and to worship him acceptably. and when the man's laboring conscience tells him that he has done none of these things, but has from childhood been guilty of foul revolt against the Majesty in the heavens, the inner pressure of self-accusation may become too heavy to bear.
the gospel can lift this destroying burden from the mind, give beauty for ashes, and the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness. but unless the weight of the burden is felt the gospel can mean nothing to the man; and until he sees a vision of God high and lifted up, there will be no woe and no burden. low views of God destroy the gospel for all who hold them.
...let us beware lest we in our pride accept the erroneous notion that idiolatry consists only in kneeling before visible objects of adoration, and that civilized peoples are therefore free from it. the essence of idolatry is the entertainment of thoughts about God that are unworthy of him...
...then followed the worship of idols fashioned after the likeness of men and birds and beasts and creeping things. but this series of degrading acts began in the mind. wrong ideas about God are not only the foundation from which the polluted waters of idolatry flow, they are themselves idolatrous. the idolater simply imagines things about God and acts as if they were true."
from tozer's knowledge of the holy
i know this is a little laborious reading all this, but I do think it is worth it. what is our view of God? how does that affect our worship to him and our relationship to him?
i too thought that idolatry was just done in the "old days" with people bowing down to fat stone people or feeding tombstones.
but how many times do we as Christians think wrongly about God and then act on those assumptions based on our erroneous preconceived ideas? it is an easy trap to fall into.
that is where the body of Christ comes in. fellow believers helping one another. hold up the correct view of God. realize that this is a reality. build one another up in the truth about God. be an encouragement to those around you and thus creating and maintaining a right standing relationship with fellow believers and with God our Father.