Friday, January 25, 2013

Letters From Birmingham Jail


King's use of pathos, ethos, and logos greatly appeal to his audience. The preachers, rabbis, and priests that his letter is addressed to captures their angle of vision. He uses multiple biblical examples to aid in their understanding of his actions and his use of real-world models plucks at the heart strings of these his rabbi brothers, such as the inclusion of the Holocaust. His pathological appeal tugged at my heart in his use of stirring stories of children's diluted feelings of inferiority because the world was simply the way it was. Had King been writing to a group of segregationalists, his essay would have looked very different because piling guilt on those individuals would not have moved them to action but only to anger. Being born in 1994 and having been taught the groundbreaking acts of Martin Luther King, it does not come as a surprise that he also supports his claims using ethical appeals. He clearly states his reasons, includes his position as a member of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and embellishes on the fact that he followed the step-by-step on how to peacefully protest.

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