Letter From Birmingham Jail Essay

As of the year 2016, there are an estimated 324,118,787 people living in America. 324,118,787 people consider themselves to be Americans and 324,118,787 people have decided that America really is worthy enough to be called home. These people, whether they were born within the country or emigrated from another country, comingle in this melting pot of a nation, sharing grocery stores and hospitals and neighborhoods and all the ideologies that make up American society, and each of these people have their own lives and opinions and personal beliefs. All of these people, all (roughly) 324,118,787 of them, fall under the definition of an American – a person who lives in America, because there is simply no other way to define what an American is when

History in the past provided us with many former activists such as Rosa Parks, Ruby Bridges, Bayard Rustin, and Martin Luther King Jr. As a well known activist, Martin Luther King Jr. wrote the “Letter From Birmingham Jail”. The long, informal letter was written to address racism which was the situation that caused conflict at the time. In other words, King’s letter was essentially an epistle informing all his critics of the historical importance and necessity of civil disobedience. The letter goes over the happenings in the colored community at Birmingham Jail. It was also wrote in response to eight clergymen defending his actions. Dr. King’s letter is notable for persuasive methods such as ethos, pathos, and logos, which was cited in the text. However, the “Letter From Birmingham Jail” shows a classical application of the Aristotelian method of persuasion that is effective for the clergymen to defend the strategy of nonviolent defiance to racism.

In 1963, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. wrote the “Letter Birmingham Jail” from jail in Birmingham, Alabama in the response to public statements issued by eight white clergy calling his actions “ unwise and untimely”. “ That this wait has almost always meant never”. Dr.King wrote this letter to demonstrate the battle against racial segregation. He was asking in this letter to make admins to stop segregation, and to become equally as one. Dr.King achieved his goals by taking action by four steps, which are gathering facts, negotiation, self-purification, and direct action. He didn 't want to start off with direct action. He wanted to negotiation before he starts a non-violent direct action. The negotiation was to bring down the signs, and that

In the “letter from Birmingham Jail” by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., he uses pathos, logos and rhetorical devices such as imagery, sarcasm and biblical allusions to show how his work of nonviolent protests are smart and how Birmingham has violated their civil rights. He expresses himself in his letter by explaining why he can not wait any longer because of the countless murders, the unsolved bombing, lynching, and violence towards the black community. MLK Jr. came across a statement which was a call for unity by eight Clergymen while being in the Birmingham city jail because of him not having a license to protest. In response to the eight Clergymen, Dr. king decided to write a historical letter letting them know that freedom was not an option because of the false promise and the continued violence. The letter is written to inform the people who are against, neutral and with segregation that it is time to take action and prove to the clergymen why he will stand up for what is right.

Martin Luther King’s Letter from Birmingham Jail addresses his fellow clergymen and others who critiqued him for his actions during this time. The clergymen along with others are addressed in an assertive tone allowing them to fully understand why his actions are justified. Throughout the letter critics are disproved through King’s effective use of diction and selection of detail.

While in solitary confinement for nearly 8 days, reverend and social justice activist, Martin Luther King Jr., wrote his famous Letter from Birmingham Jail in response to the criticism he received for his non-violent protests. Several clergy who negatively critiqued King’s approach of seeking justice, wrote A Call for Unity, arguing that his protests were senseless and improper. Within the article, the clergymen provide nine different critiques that asserted how King’s protest are invalid, uneffective, and simply unintelligent in the fight for obtaining justice and equity for individuals of color. His letter has become one of the most profound pieces of literature of the 20th century, as King uses vivid examples and eloquent rhetorical devices to counter all nine arguments.

The Letter from Birmingham Jail and the I have a Dream Speech, both written by Martin Luther King Jr., explain the same message to people in two different ways. The Letter from Birmingham Jail was to write a letter to defend the strategy of nonviolent resistance to racism. He wrote this because he wants African Americans to come together and peacefully protest the unjust laws that are in place. On the other hand, his speech was to a large group of citizens, black and white, fighting for freedom, equality, justice and love. He used many rhetorical devices in his speech and letter that compared the two, and to show the differences in a clear way.

Words can change the world in many ways. Many of those ways can really make an impact on a person’s life or mind set. In the speech “I Have A Dream” by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., it proved to solidify the peace and fairness that he aimed to gain in this country by ending segregation between black and white people. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. vividly painted his vision of a better future for people of all colors in America. His words of power and rhetoric had made Dr. King create the emotion of empowerment for his huge audience. The one technique that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. uses is repetition.

Martin Luther King, Jr. was an extremely impactful activist during the Civil Rights Movement that gave over 2,500 speeches in his lifetime. Of these speeches, his most popular is his famous I Have a Dream speech that he gave on August 28, 1963 in Washington, D.C. during the March on Washington. Even famous speakers like Martin Luther King, Jr. use persuasive techniques to appeal to the different sides of their audiences. In order to appeal to his predominately African American audience, Martin Luther King, Jr. makes reference to Abraham Lincoln and his granting freedom to slaves by signing the Emancipation Proclamation. King also discusses his personal life, along with his family and children, to show the crowd that he is fighting for the same things as them. In his I Have a Dream speech, Martin Luther King, Jr. used ethos to increase his credibility with his audience, pathos to appeal to his audience’s emotional side, and logos to appeal to his audience’s logical side.

In 1963 Martin Luther King Jr. was sent to jail because of a peaceful protest, protesting treatments of blacks in Birmingham. Before the protest a court ordered that protests couldn’t be held in Birmingham. While being held in Birmingham, King wrote what came to be known as the “Letter from Birmingham Jail” Not even King himself could predict how much of an impact this letter would have on the Civil Rights Movement. In the letter kind defended Kings beliefs on Nonviolent Protests, King also counters the accusations of him breaking laws by categorizing segregation laws into just and unjust laws. King uses this principle to help persuade others to join him in his acts of civil disobedience.

In 1963 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. protested the racial segregation in Birmingham and got arrested. While he was in jail he read a newspaper and 8 white clergymen stated their opinion of him. That inspired his Letter From Birmingham Jail. After he got out he continued to protest and  he wrote his I Have a Dream Speech. He spoke in front of about 10,000 people in Washington DC. in 1963. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. spoke his I Have a Dream Speech to try and grab the attention to anyone willing to listen. He did that to try and get the rights that the African American people deserve but don’t get. He also wrote his Letter From Birmingham Jail on April 6, 1963 to 8 white clergymen to reply to what they said about him for protesting racial segregation. They said that what he was doing was “unwise and untimely.” Both of the pieces writing had logos which is a logical appeal and pathos which is emotional appeal.  In this essay I will compare the two pieces of writing that Martin Luther King Jr. wrote and how he used logos and pathos in both pieces.

Civil rights leader and social activist Martin Luther King Jr. wrote a world renown correspondence, Letter From Birmingham Jail, in April of 1963, during a time when segregation was at it’s peak in the South. 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. In response to King’s peaceful protesting, the white community viewed “[his] nonviolent efforts as those of an extremist,” and subsequently imprisoned the pastor (para 27). King specifically wrote to the white clergymen who had earlier addressed a letter to him as to why he was apprehended, in which they argued that his actions were untimely and unconstitutional. In response, King emphasized that justice is never timely, and the refusal to acknowledge equal rights was inhumane and regressive. Throughout the text, King utilized the values of his audience to gain sympathy and later on support. His use of diction and syntax would align his mission to God’s, and show that he was in the right and the clergymen were in the wrong.

Martin Luther King Jr. wrote the letter from jail, after he got arrested during a peaceful protest. At the time segregation was still a part of the culture in the United States and Martin Luther King Jr. and his followers were working diligently and peacefully to try and make a change in people’s hearts about segregation. In this letter MLK Jr. is writing to defend his strategy of nonviolent resistance to racism, which he does effectively by using rhetoric.

Martin Luther King’s speech, “I Have a Dream” is vastly recognized as one of the best speeches ever given. His passionate demand for racial justice and an integrated society became popular throughout the Black community. His words proved to give the nation a new vocabulary to express what was happening to them. Martin was famously a pacifist, so in his speech, he advocated peaceful protesting and passively fighting against racial segregation.

In A letter from Birmingham jail, Martin Luther King Jr writes to the clergy men and his supporters as “A Call for Unity”. King had been put under arrest from partaking in a peaceful march against segregation on property that he did not have permission to be marching on. In the 1960’s segregation laws and policies were under the Jim Crow regulations; separate racial schools, colored-only bathrooms, separate places for the colored to eat and they would have to sit in the back of the bus. The letter King wrote was critical because he reaches out to the Clergymen from Birmingham Prison and uses the rhetorical appeal of his own character to establish his credibility on the subject of racial discrimination and injustice.