These two techniques played a crucial role in furthering his purpose and in provoking a powerful response from the audience that made this speech memorable and awe-inspiring. While there were consistent and impactful efforts made by various groups for equality throughout the civil rights era, the proximity between the public release of the letter, found nation-wide by late 1963, and the passing of the Civil Rights Act in early July 1964 shows the direct impact the letter had on social attitudes following its publicization. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law." Copyright 2023 IPL.org All rights reserved. We allow people to think that it is okay to act unjustly towards some individuals. King uses parallelism to add balance and rhythm to his rhetoric. However, they each have different ideas about freedom, and about what they want their audience to do. Martin Luther found himself arrested on the twelfth of April 1963 after leading a peaceful protest throughout Birmingham, Alabama after he defied a state courts injunction and led a march of black protesters without a permit, urging an Easter boycott of white-owned stores (Jr., Martin Luther King). 1, no. On the other hand, logical appeals helps to grasp the concept better and provides facts that prove it to be true. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. By stating the obvious point and implying that moderates act as though this was not true, he accuses them of both hypocrisy and injustice. Dr. King brought people up and gave them hope that one day everything will be taken care of and we 'll all be happy, he said that one day we 'll have peace and love among each other. He deliberately tries to make the audience feel as if racial segregation is both wrong and against basic morals. With the use of King's rhetorical devices, he described the ways of the Birmingham community and their beliefs, connected to the reader on an emotional level, and brought to light the overall issues dealing with segregation., The letter was ostensibly conceived in response to a letter that had recently run in a local newspaper which had claimed that the protest were "unwise and untimely." In short, Martin Luther King Jr. includes rhetorical devices in his writing. In Kings speech he. This period of quiet speculation over the law illuminates the national divide in opinion over the matter, one which King helped persuade positively. The main argument Dr. King is making in the letter is the protest being done in Birmingham is "wise" and most important "timely". Not only does he use pathos to humanize himself, but he also uses it to humanize his immediate audience, the eight clergymen. Yes he does criticize the white clergymen but basically he is trying to tell them that they should stop this segregation and that the black are not to be mistreated. It managed to inspire a generation of blacks to never give up and made thousands of white Americans bitterly ashamed of their actions, forging a new start for society. We will write a custom Essay on King's Allusion in "Letter From Birmingham Jail" specifically for you. While in his cell, he composed the famous Letter from Birmingham Jail. To summarize, Martin Luther Kings rhetoric is effective and ultimately changed the course of the Civil Rights movement for the better. In order to dispel any misguided ideas that whites have of the Negroes fortune, King tells them directly that Negroes are in poverty as everybody is blocking them from entering the ocean of material prosperity. The second time King uses antithesis is when he states that Nineteen Sixty-Three is not an end, but a beginning, which he aims to express that the revolution will not stop at 1963; rather it will have a new beginning. We believe that King states in the first sentence himself that he does not usually comment upon the criticism of his work. Martin Luther King, more than any other figure, shaped American life from the mid-"'"50s to the late "'"60s. Therefore, as King fabricates antithetic parallelism, he constructs logos and persuades the audience to take prompt action against injustice through the careful juxtaposition of inverse statements. King through this letter tries to express his, "Martin Luther King Jr.'s letter from Birmingham Jail, which was written in April 16, 1963, is a passionate letter that addresses and responds to the issue and criticism that a group of white clergymen had thrown at him and his pro- black American organization about his and his organization's non- violent demonstrative actions against racial prejudice and injustice among black Americans in Birmingham. The Martin Luther King, Jr., Research and Education Institute. Fred Shuttlesworth, defied an injunction against protesting on Good Friday in 1963. Both lincolns Gettysburg Address and Martin Luther King's I have a dream speech are similar in that they both express the concept of freedom to achieve their purpose. you can use them for inspiration and simplify your student life. He opens with an explanation to his response, stating, Seldom, if ever, do I pause to answer criticism of my work and ideasBut since I feel that you are men of genuine good will and your criticisms are sincerely set forth, I would like to answer your statement in what I hope will be patient and reasonable terms(King 1). He needed something, that special something, that would ignite the fire that had somehow died out. All of these factors influence each other to shape rhetoric, which Bitzer describes as, pragmatic; it comes into existence for the sake of something beyond itself (3), with Martin Luther Kings. King organized various non-violent demonstrations in Birmingham, Alabama that resulted in his arrest. , vol. Parallelism takes many forms in literature, such as anaphora, antithesis, asyndeton, epistrophe, etc. SophAbs. Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr. were both two African American civil rights activists who were very prominent throughout history. Throughout the letter, Dr. King does a tremendous job of supporting his argument with the three elements of Aristotles rhetorical appeal. King was jailed along with large numbers of his supporters, including hundreds of schoolchildren. Martin Luther leading peaceful Birmingham protest, AP News. Martin Luther King Jr. twists the perspective of his audience -- Southern clergymen -- to create antithetic parallelism in Letter from Birmingham Jail. The amount of original essays that we did for our clients, The amount of original essays that we did for our clients. Despite this, the clergy never questions whether or not segregation is unjust. Although Kings reply was addressed to the Alabama clergyman, its target audience was the white people. When King was making his mark in American history, the United States was experiencing great social unrest due to the injustice towards their colored citizens, which would lead to social rights rallies and unnecessary violence. and may encompass the audience, as seen while analysing Letter From Birmingham Jail. Initially, the eight Birmingham clergymen are the audience and while they were not overtly racist, King uses rhetoric meant to have them understand his urgency. 1, Penn State University Press, 1968, pp. These encompass his exigence, at its most simple and precise, and validify the importance behind transforming the country in a positive way. " Any law that uplifts human personality is just." Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s Letter from a Birmingham Jail is a letter that illustrates oppression being a large battle fought in this generation and location. In both of these writings Dr. King uses logos - logical persuasion - and pathos - emotional appeal - to change the opinions of people who were for segregation and against civil rights. This protest, his subsequent arrest, and the clergymens public statement ostensibly make up the rhetorical exigence, but it truly stems from a much larger and dangerous situation at hand: the overwhelming state of anti-black prejudice spread socially, systematically, and legislatively in America since the countrys implementation of slavery in Jamestown, 1619. He writes how the white church is often disappointed in the African Americans lack of patience and how they are quick to be willing to break laws. "Letter from Birmingham Jail" Allusion Essay. Through powerful, emotionally-loaded diction, syntax, and figurative language, King adopts a disheartened tone later shifts into a determined tone in order to express and reflect on his disappointment with the churchs inaction and his goals for the future. Throughout the work, Letter from Bimingham Jail, Martin Luther constantly uses examples from historical figures in order to unite his argument that action must be taken in order to end discrimination and segregation. But immediately after Dr. King speaks out on how after 100 years Blacks still do not have the free will that is deserved. In this essay, King also brings up why he is justified in his preaching about the separation of African-Americans and white people. The letter was addressed to clergymen who had criticized King and made many claims against him. The first to come to mind for most would be civil rights activism, as he was an instrumental figure in the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. Order can only be held for so long whilst injustice is around. Constraints bring light to the obstacles this rhetoric may face, whether it be social, political, economical, etc. While his actions may not have had much success at first during the 1960s what made his arguments so powerful was his use of pathos and logos., In Dr. Martin Luther Kings letter from Birmingham, he targeted specific people who he wrote the letter for including everybody. Martin Luther King Jr.s Letter from Birmingham Jail. The Atlantic, Atlantic Media Company, 29 Jan. 2021, https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/02/letter-from-a-birmingham-jail/552461/. While this fight had been raging for nearly 10 years, the release in 1963 was shortly followed by the Civil Rights Act in 1964. Lastly, King is constrained by his medium. Finally, King uses antithesis one more time at the end of his speech, when he writes when all of Gods children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands. The pairs he mentions are all the direct opposites of each other, yet he says that they will all join hands together and be friends. You may use it as a guide or sample for writing your own . Moreover, King juxtaposes contradictory statements to bolster the legitimacy of his argument against injustice -- in stark contrast to the racist beliefs held by the clergy -- which creates logos that he later capitalizes on to instill celerity within the audience. Egypt) and titles (e.g. This use of parallelism draws on the emotions of personal experiences to persuade that segregation is a problem in a myriad of ways. During this letter, King then uses the time to unroot the occasion of nonviolent protests in BIrmingham and the disappointing leadership of the clergy. parallelism really etches into the audience's mind the seemingly never-ending hardships blacks face and the repetition makes it seem like a regular routine they endure. Prior to the mid 20th century, social injustice, by means of the Jim Crow laws, gave way to a disparity in the treatment of minorities, especially African Americans, when compared to Caucasians. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust(Barnet and Bedau 742). The answer is found in the fact that there are two types of laws: there are just laws, and there are unjust laws Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Throughout the letter critics are disproved through Kings effective use of diction and selection of detail. It was important for King to address this audience as their support would ultimately make the largest difference in the movement. 1, Penn State University Press, 1968, pp. As a black man and pacifist-forward figurehead of the Civil Rights movement, the way Martin Luther is perceived is mostly dictated by preconceived biases and is rampant, widespread, and polarized. The continuous mistreatment of African Americans for over a century was, at last, deeply questioned and challenged nationwide with the growing popularity of the Civil Rights movement, and the topic of equality for all had divided the country. MarkAHA. Several clergy who negatively critiqued Kings approach of seeking justice, wrote A Call for Unity, arguing that his protests were senseless and improper. The eight clergymen in Birmingham released a public statement of caution regarding the protesters actions as unwise and untimely (King 1), to which Martins letter is a direct response. 262). Who was he truly writing for? He hopes that "[o]ne day the South will know that [the Negroes] were in reality standing up for the best in the American dream" (47), and that "the evil system of segregation" (46) will come to an end. Parallelism/ Juxtaposition. Throughout the essay, King uses several powerful tones to complement his strong opinion, Martin Luther King Jrs Letter from Birmingham Jail is one his many writings on segregation and racial inequality towards blacks in the southern American states. His audience ranged between those who his message empowered, a radical positive force, and those who disagreed, made up of southern states, extremist groups, and the majority of American citizens stuck in their racial prejudices. This is the beginning of King's point-by-point rebuttal of the criticisms leveled against him. Dr. King wrote 2 famous works, Dream and Birmingham and each had a different audience and purpose. First, King writes that the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. This antithesis makes the audience realize that the Negroes have been left behind and ignored while the rest of modern society has charged forward into prosperity and fortune. In this example, King employs antithesis to highlight the logical structure and urgency of his argument against inequity, which allows him to establish logos. In Birmingham, Alabama, in the spring of 1963, King's campaign to end segregation at lunch counters and in hiring practices drew nationwide attention when police turned dogs and fire hoses on the demonstrators. Even now, it continues to make generations of people, not just Americans, to give up their racist beliefs and advocate social colorblindness. Without King, America would be probably still heavily segregated. While the Civil Rights movement superseded the dismantling of Jim Crow, the social ideologies and lackadaisical legislature behind anti-black prejudice continued to rack the country far into the 1960s. " Any law that degrades human personality is unjust." Back then, people were ready to oppose unjust laws that were causing inequality and preventing progress.
parallelism in letter from birmingham jail