MLK Jr. and Malcolm XLESSONS IN MAKING SPEECHES

The Synthesis Essay Prompt:

Using documents from both King Jr. and Malcolm X, discuss how they persuade their audiences to their goals and how their use of rhetoric reinforces their message and appeals to their audience.

Brainstorm 3 potential points that you can

Discuss the differing goals of the competing leaders

Examine specific themes/concepts/calls to action

Identify multiple examples of support from multiple sources (preparing to weave the writer’s points)

Timeline of the Civil Rights Movements

19th Century: The Emancipation Debates: From 1830 through the Civil War, Black activists and community leaders met in local, state, and national conventions to discuss their views on ending slavery and improving the lives of Black people.

20th Century: The Self-Determination Debates: Part of the debate was over how Blacks who remained in the south could "catch up" with the north. This gave energy to the civil rights movement. Part of the debate was over economic issues of jobs and housing and involved both Black capitalists and workers. This ignited an ideological throw down over capitalism and socialism.

The Glorious 1960s: A Golden Age of Struggle: The fight for reform, even when successful, leads to a continuation of oppression in new forms. Everywhere the watchword became revolution, from Paris to Peking, from Mozambique to Mississippi.

Civil Rights Movement

When most people think of the Civil Rights Movement in America, they think of Martin Luther King, Jr. Delivering his "I Have a Dream" speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial on August 28, 1963 and receiving the Nobel Peace Prize the following year secured his fame as the voice of non-violent, mass protest in the 1960s.

But "the Movement" achieved its greatest results—the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act—due to the competing strategies and agendas of diverse individuals. Even black Americans, the primary beneficiaries of this landmark legislation, did not agree on the tactics that should be used to secure the equal protection of their rights.

Civil Rights Groups and Inequality

There was little consensus on how to promote equality on a national level: groups such as the NAACP, CORE, and Dr. Martin Luther King’s SCLC, endorsed peaceful methods and believed change could be affected by working around the established system

Other groups such as the Black Panthers, the Nation of Islam, and the Black Nationalist Movement advocated retaliatory violence and a separation of the races.

There were numerous marches, rallies, strikes, riots, and violent confrontations with the police. National leaders such as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X would be assassinated, violence would claim the lives of young and old, and rigged all-white juries mocked justice in cases involving crimes perpetrated by whites against African Americans.

Restaurants, hotels, night clubs, public facilities, and the school systems were still segregated during the early sixties, and educational and job opportunities for minorities were far below those available to the white majority.

The African-American community, being in the minority, depended on the support of the white population, and at least in terms of sentiment, those caught up in the spirit of the hippie movement took the cause of racial justice and equality to heart, and often to the streets.

MLK Jr.

Martin Luther King, Jr. first came to national prominence through his leadership of the Montgomery bus boycott in 1955-56, which helped desegregate public transportation in Montgomery, Alabama.

A gifted preacher and committed pacifist, King thought that non-violent, direct action against racial segregation provided the best means of securing the full integration of blacks into the mainstream of American life.

As he wrote in his famous "Letter from Birmingham Jail," "I have consistently preached that nonviolence demands that the means we use must be as pure as the ends we seek."

Malcolm X

It was precisely the white population of America that Malcolm X took issue with in the years he served as chief spokesman for the Nation of Islam (sometimes referred to as the Black Muslims).

Believing that blacks were God's chosen people, Malcolm X preached that they should separate from whites, who were destined for divine punishment because of their longstanding oppression of blacks. As he once remarked, "You don't integrate with a sinking ship."

Whites had proven they were long on professing and short on practicing their ideals of equality and freedom, and so Malcolm X thought only a separate nation for blacks could provide the basis for their self-improvement and advancement as a people.

Persuading a National Audience: “I Have a Dream”

5 Key Speech Techniques

Anaphora: Emphasize phrases by repeating at the beginning of sentences

Repeat key “theme” words throughout your speech

Utilize appropriate quotations or allusions

Use specific examples to “ground” your arguments

Use metaphors to highlight contrasting concepts

Lesson One: Anaphora/Repetition

“I have a dream” is repeated in eight successive sentences, and is one of the most often cited examples of anaphora in modern rhetoric. But this is just one of eight occurrences of anaphora in this speech. By order of introduction, here are the key phrases:

“One hundred years later…” [paragraph 3]

“Now is the time…” [paragraph 6]

“We must…” [paragraph 8]

“We can never (cannot) be satisfied…” [paragraph 13]

“Go back to…” [paragraph 14]

“I Have a Dream…” [paragraphs 16 through 24]

“With this faith, …” [paragraph 26]

“Let freedom ring (from) …” [paragraphs 27 through 41]

Lesson Two: Repeat Key “Theme” Words Throughout Your Speech

freedom (20 times)

we (30 times), our (17 times), you (8 times)

nation (10 times), america (5 times), american (4 times)

justice (8 times) and injustice (3 times)

dream (11 times)

Lesson Three: Utilize Appropriate Quotations or Allusions

Consider that King is delivering his speech on the Mall in Washington D.C.

“Five score years ago…” [paragraph 2] refers to Lincoln’s famous Gettysburg Address speech which began

“Four score and seven years ago…” This allusion is particularly poignant given that King was speaking in front of the Lincoln Memorial.

“Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness” [and the rest of paragraph 4] is a reference to the United States Declaration of Independence.

Lesson Three: Biblical Allusions

Numerous Biblical allusions provide the moral basis for King’s arguments and solidify his ethos:

“It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.” [paragraph 2] alludes to Psalms 30:5 “For his anger is but for a moment; his favor is for a lifetime. Weeping may linger for the night, but joy comes with the morning.“

“Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred.” [paragraph 8] evokes Jeremiah 2:13 “for my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living water, and dug out cisterns for themselves, cracked cisterns that can hold no water.“

No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream. Amos 5:24 “But let judgment run down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream.”

It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity. Psalm 30:5 “… weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.”

And when this happens, . . . we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: Galatians 3:28 “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.”

Lesson Four: Use specific examples to “ground” your arguments One way that Martin Luther King Jr. accomplishes this is to make numerous geographic references

throughout the speech:

Mississippi, New York [paragraph 13] Mississippi, Alabama, South Carolina, Georgia, Louisiana [14]

Georgia [18] Mississippi [19] Alabama [22]

New Hampshire [32], New York [33], Pennsylvania [34], Colorado [35], California [36], Georgia [37], Tennessee [38], Mississippi [39]

Note that Mississippi is mentioned on four separate occasions. This is not accidental; mentioning Mississippi would evoke some of the strongest emotions and images for his audience.

Additionally, King uses relatively generic geographic references to make his message more inclusive:

“slums and ghettos of our northern cities” [paragraph 14]

“the South” [25]

“From every mountainside” [40]

“from every village and every hamlet” [41]

Lesson Five: Use Metaphors to Highlight Contrasting Concepts

For example, to contrast segregation with racial justice, King evokes the contrasting metaphors of dark and desolate valley (of segregation) and sunlit path (of racial justice.)

“joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity” [paragraph 2]

“the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity” [3]

“rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice” [6]

“This sweltering summer of the Negro’s legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality.” [7]

“sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.” [19]

Consider also the extended analogy of the check and the banking terminology that is used to build the analogy 

Letter from Birmingham Religious Leaders

What are their claims against King’s involvement?

How do they characterize the local government, police and community leaders?

How is their religious professions serve their letter to King Jr.?

Questions to Consider: Letter from Birmingham Jail

Does King consider himself an “outsider” by staging a civil rights protest in Birmingham? List three reasons he gives in response to this criticism.

Explain the four-step process King outlines for their nonviolent campaign.

Does King recognize the danger of breaking laws in order to change them? How does he connect the means of civil disobedience with its aim in order to justify this form of nonviolent resistance?

Does King think the tension stirred up by his protest movement helps or hinders social and political reform?

How does King respond to the charge that he is an extremist? Whom does he identify as the real extremists?

Why is King hopeful about the prospects for equal rights for black Americans? Give specific examples and reasons he mentions to support your answer.

Malcolm X: Biography

Malcolm X had an array of many different viewpoints in his lifetime. From the young boy he started out as, to the grown man he came to be, his point of views were always in stark contrast to the more “accepted” ideologies at the time.

Malcolm X reached his greatest level of leadership in the 1960's. He was the ideological leader for Black radicalism: Black religion (spirituality and morality), Black nationalism (institution building and collective action), Panafricanism (identity and internationalism), and Socialism (freedom/justice/ equality and anti-imperialism).

Even as Malcolm X’s own ideologies began to change over time, specifically after his break from Elijah Muhammad and the Nation of Islam, and after his break; it is quite simple to see that Malcolm X himself was a self-taught scholar who was always searching for the right way, among wrong ways, to do things.

Malcolm X: Message to the Grassroots

What does Malcolm X think the goal of any revolution should be?

How does Malcolm X justify violence as a means for black Americans to improve themselves?

According to Malcolm X, what is the difference between a “Negro” revolution and a “black” revolution?

According to Malcolm X, what are “Uncle Toms” and how do they slow progress for blacks in America?

Message: Logical Fallacies and Rhetorical Strategies

Paragraph 1

False Dichotomy (creates Only two extremes): White and Non-White

 

Diction (Word Choice): And during the few moments that we have left, we want to have just an off-the-cuff chat between you and me -- us.

Amplification (repeating a word, adding more information): “problem”

Message: Paragraphs 2, 3, 4

Bandwagon Appeal (Building an US—everyone is doing it): What you and I need to do is learn to forget our differences. When we come together, we don't come together as Baptists or Methodists

 Anaphora (Repetition of beginning of sentence): You don't catch hell 'cause you're a

Enumeration (detailing parts, causes, effects): “So we are all black people, so-called Negroes, second-class citizens, ex-slaves.”/ “You came here on a slave ship -- in chains, like a horse, or a cow, or a chicken.”

Hypophora (asking a question in order to answer it): But what else are you? You are ex-slaves. You didn't come here on the "Mayflower." You came here on a slave ship

Allusion (reference to history, literature, etc.): Mayflower, Pilgrims, Founding Fathers

Amplification: “common”

Overgeneralization: the white man. He's an enemy to all of us. I know some of you all think that some of them aren't enemies. Time will tell.

Paragraphs 5, 6, 7

Allusion: Bandung Conference

Anaphora: Some of them were

Parallelism: was being colonized by/ didn't have nuclear weapons; they didn't have jet planes; they didn't have all of the heavy armaments that the white man has. But they had unity.

Hasty Generalization (leads you to a conclusion by providing insufficient evidence): Once they excluded the white man, they found that they could get together. Once they kept him out, everybody else fell right in and fell in line

Paragraph 8

False Analogy (creating a misleading comparison between two things): Does the comparison between colonization/imperialism in Africa and Asia= same problems in the United States for non-whites. Solving “black” problems in private= similar to family solving problems

Amplification: same man

Ad Hominem (At the man)—attacking an argument by attacking the person: “blue eyes and blond hair and pale skin—same man”

Ballot or the Bullet: Malcolm X

Define (as the term is used in the Speech):

Americanism

Black nationalism

The ballot

The bullet

 

Choose a line from the 3 opening Paragraphs and explain how that line sets a particular TONE for Malcolm X’s speech.

Ballot or the Bullet: Argumentation Why does X open his speech with a discussion of his religion? (Choose 2 details from the speech

which help to explain the connection you see between X’s religious ideas and the struggle for Civil Rights)

Malcolm uses anaphora. Explain what the function of his use of this device is in the section of the speech.

Identify a rhetorical strategy used by Malcolm X and explain its connection to his overall ARGUMENT 

Explain how the discussion of Black Nationalism impacts/supports/explains X’s PURPOSE in his speech. 

Towards the end of the speech, X begins to explore the connection between human rights and civil rights. Summarize his position about how the two relate, using 2-3 quotes as supporting evidence.

Choose two examples of how Malcolm X’s rhetoric and language differs from that of MLK Jr. and explain WHY he chooses to speak/argue differently, connecting this to HOW these strategies are intended to work on his AUDIENCE.