Rhetorical Analysis of Obama’s Victory Speech

Rhetorical Analysis of Obama’s Victory Speech
On November 6th, 2012, Barack Obama was re-elected as president of the U.S. The following day, Barack Obama held his victory speech. This paper will analyze and comment on an excerpt of that particular victory speech and the key focus of the analysis will be on the rhetorical effects of the speech. By using many forms of rhetorical tools like Anaphora or Tautology, President Barack Obama manages to give a speech that is full of American ideas of life, like the American Promise, the American Dream and the future. The speech is very similar to the one he did in 2008 at the Democratic Convention, and contains many form of repetition and “between the lines” political views. In the first couple of paragraphs, Barack Obama deliberately begins his sentences with the same couple of words, e.g. “You’ll hear…”, “We want…” or “That’s…” followed by positive ideas about the USA, Americans or what the future will bring. This is when the first rhetorical tool is used, and Barack Obama uses Anaphora by starting his sentences with the same lines over and over again. This is a great way to make his statements stand out both greater than they are and easier to remember. Moving on from here, Barack Obama talks about the American Spirit, and gives several examples on how the U.S. will have ended the economic crisis and war in a very near future. The future itself is a huge topic in the speech and when talking about it, Barack Obama gently uses as many rhetorical tools as possible to ensure that the message goes through. One of these rhetorical tools is the Apostrophe, for example when he says: “It’s not always a straight line. It’s not always a smooth path.” But also when he is talking about the union straight from the beginning: “It moves forward because of you. It moves forward because…” He talks about the union and the future like they were capable of understanding what was said about them, or if they were alive, and once again,...