MLK " I had a dream" speech analysis

Embed Size (px)

Citation preview

  • 8/11/2019 MLK " I had a dream" speech analysis

    1/2

    Near the beginning of his speech, Dr. King says: It seemed as if there was a real promise of hope for the

    poorboth black and whitethrough the poverty program Then came the buildup in Vietnam, and I

    watched this program broken and eviscerated

    This excerpt of Dr. Kings speech made me realize he wasnt just an advocate for African- America

    people. In my mind, when I think of Martin Luther King I think of a man that spoke up for the rights ofonly the African American people however, I was wrong. He spoke up for the underprivileged and those

    whose rights had been stripped. Here hes talking about the Poverty Program that was set up in that

    time to help those that needed help like a type of welfare. He associates the decay of this program to

    the exponential growth of the war. Kings point here is: Why is this grand country spending so much

    money on the war, backing the French against the Vietnamese when we have people in our country

    suffering? Why blacks and whites are not allowed to attend the same school or sit in the same areas but

    are able to die side-by-side? Dr. King defends the poor, poor in health, poor in spirit, poor in necessities

    and thats why this quote is so important to me. It was the first realization that King did not only defend

    the blacks.

    The war in Vietnam is but a symptom of a far deeper malady within the American spirit

    This quote was brought in after Dr. King stated a lot of fact. For instance, I did not know that we supplied

    the French with a lot if not most of the weapons and materials for the Vietnam War. King states that

    even in other countries we are the suppliers of most of the weapons, during war even in the Nazi era.

    At this point in his speech hes saying when is America going to start portraying the right character?

    America was known as the revolutionary country, the land of the free after our actions during the

    Vietnam War, America will no longer be the epitome of those words. Dr. King is saying our government

    is not making the right choices so when are we going to speak up? The citizens of America are theAmerican Spirit.

    In elementary school we learn I have a dream the name of a speech that Martin Luther King gave

    during the oppressive times of the Blacks. We learn that Martin Luther King was a peacekeeper in that

    era; he wanted to fight with the pen and not the sword. Reading and listening to this speech makes me

    realize that Martin Luther King was far much more than that. He was very educated and very aware of

    the truth behind America the land of the free. In his speech he mentions a time earlier in his life that

    he was speaking with some young African- American men that were emotionally scarred from the

    violence, the oppression and the war in Vietnam. All they wanted was to fight against the enemy

    (whites) when King tried to tell them that violence was not the answer they burst with anger. Kingrealized he could not approach the young scarred AfricanAmerican people without showing them how

    to fight with words, a big realization for him to make himself. He was wise beyond his years and it would

    have been an honor to meet such a man. For those people that get stage fright, imagine being the voice,

    the face and the leader of an enormous civil movement for an entire race. Its a huge burden, in 1954 he

    was honored with the Nobel Peace Prize, talk about a weight on your shoulders.

  • 8/11/2019 MLK " I had a dream" speech analysis

    2/2