Kennedy Commencement Speech Analysis

John F. Kennedy was president from 1961 to 1963, in the height of the Cold War. During his presidency, the Cuban Missile Crisis occurred, which was the closet that the United States and Soviet Union ever came to war. Less than a year after this event, in 1963 President Kennedy gave an impassioned commencement speech at American University. His speech was not filled with inflammatory rhetoric, like calling the Soviet Union an “evil empire” as Ronald Reagan famously would. His speech instead, called for peace, disarmament, and cooperation between the two countries. Not a utopia, but a realistic peace. Though it was a commencement speech at American University, it was really addressed to people throughout the entire country. In his speech he successfully …show more content…
He praises them for the feat of their scientific accomplishments and the 20 million lives they sacrificed in World War two. He again appeals to the pathos of the audience when saying, “we all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children 's future. And we are all mortal.” Rather than creating an emotional connection between the speaker and the audience, this use of pathos is used to create a connection between the people of the United States and Soviet Union in hopes of greater understanding between the two.
Building on this, Kennedy speaks of the “ironic but accurate fact” that a war would devastate our two countries the most of any of the global powers. He lists three things that Americans should do, which include: reexamining our attitudes towards peace, the Soviet Union, and the Cold War. This further builds the bridge of understanding between the two nations, using elements of pathos and logos. The image trying to be conveyed to the audience is of the people of the Soviet Union as being similar to them, and not an evil entity bent on the destruction of the United …show more content…
spent on nuclear arms, which we hope to never use. These are aspects of logos that Tamar, in her work, considers the most important of the three argumentations in political discourse. Kennedy speaks about how this massive amount of money could be invested into the United States to combat poverty and disease. Instead, we are trapped in a perpetual arms race with enough weapons to destroy the world multiple times over. These are factual statements, which possess strong sway over an audience, and can influence those undecided toward Kennedy’s