Letter From Birmingham Jail Logos

On April 16, 1963, from a jail in Birmingham, Alabama, Martin Luther King Jr. composed an extensive letter to eight clergymen who condemned the timing of the civil rights movement. Although the letter was addressed to these eight clergymen, the Letter from Birmingham Jail speaks to a national audience, especially King’s “Christian and Jewish brothers”(King, 29). His peaceful but firm letter serves as a remarkably persuasive voice to an immensely chaotic mess, and is seen as a major turning point in the civil rights movement. King believes that without direct action, the full rights for African Americans could never be achieved. He defends the impatience of people in the civil rights movement, upholding that without forceful

In the “Letter from Birmingham Jail” Martin Luther King uses pathos, logos, and ethos to really convey his message. Though he uses all three very effectively, King most effectively uses pathos and logos by giving illustrations of what African Americans faced every day, examples in history in which the law was not right, and the make-up of a just or unjust law.

Martin Luther King, Jr., a man who seldom cared what other people thought about him, lived in the moment. In doing so, He became furious over the amount of injustice. This essay shows King’s fury over injustice through the use of rhetorical appeals through ethos, logos, and pathos.

In Martin Luther King Jr.ʻs (MLK) “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” excessive use of rhetoric devices are used such as logos (logical), pathos (emotional) and ethos (ethical). Although all examples of rhetoric are present, some seem to appeal more than others. Some of the most effective rhetoric used in the “Letter from Birmingham Jail” are logos and pathos. While there are multiple examples of ethical (ethos) rhetoric and many more additional rhetorical devices, logical and emotional appliances seem to have an abundant amount of examples relative to these two devices. Therefore, in this prompt, I will further explore the meanings of these implements and examples referring to this topic.

King uses logos by backing up each of the points he makes with just more facts and counter arguments, often saying what could be different but then coming up with an answer. Such as King listing what usually happens in a nonviolent campaigns on page 1. He also uses facts that people can’t deny. King was fighting against injustices and unjust laws and was rallying the people to go against these injustices and encouraging people to fight against laws that are wrong, it is the citizens duty to know what is right and wrong, which Martin Luther King was telling people to do. Swift on the other hand wasn’t half bad, he had logical points backing up his inhuman ideas but still people would not agree unless they are mentally sick. King used Logical points that people could agree with unlike Swift. King uses logos because he knows people will listen to his valid points and hopefully change the world, Swift uses logos to catch people eys on how thought out his grueling plan

Martin Luther King, Jr., uses pathos, ethos, and logos in his “Letter from Birmingham Jail.” An example of pathos, is when King talks about a little girl seeing an advertisement for an amusement park. She cries when her dad tells her that she is not allowed to go to the amusement park, due to the fact that colored people are not allowed in there. This shows that even children where not spared from racism. One way King uses ethos, is how he quotes multiple historical figures in his letter in order to point out that being an extremists does not necessarily evil.

An example of logos in “The Letter of Birmingham” is “If I sought to answer all the criticisms that cross my desk, my secretaries would have little time for anything other than such correspondence in the course of the day…”. (springboard book pg 206). This is an example of logos because Martin Luther King Jr. states a fact and expresses how he would feel if he stopped what he was doing to reply to what

Many barriers can evolve from people who grow up with no formal education, who only speaking their local dialect, and who have little exposure to people who are different from them. Ethnic people who can acquire a formal education, practice biculturalism, and code switch are able to be much more successful in life. It is a well-known fact that having a formal education has a major impact on a person’s earning potential and life success. Needing to understand and navigate cultures other than one’s own culture is another critical life skill. This is common thread of Dr. King, Fredrick Douglas, Amy Tan’s and myself.

In the “Letter from Birmingham Jail” Martin Luther King uses logos and alliteration to advocate for civil disobedience. This is shown on page seven in paragraph thirteen when MLK says, “All segregation statutes are unjust because segregation distorts the soul and damages the personality… Hence segregation is not only politically, economically, and sociologically unsound, it is morally wrong and awful”. This quote displays MLK’s intense use of logos because he explains that segregation is unjust and gives reasons as to why this is true. Martin Luther King describes distortion of the soul and personality to reason that segregation doesn’t make sense in our society. He logically explains why segregation is toxic to people and the country as a

The Letter from Birmingham Jail was written in August 1963 by Martin Luther King Jr., a Civil Rights leader. During this time he was held in Birmingham Jail for his involvement in peaceful protests against segregation. Due to the protest, eight religious leaders issued a public statement listing their concerns and cautions towards it. The letter was Dr. King’s response to it. In the letter, he states why segregation and racial injustice must end and that direct action must be taken. Throughout the letter, he convinces the reader to side with him and his cause through the use of figurative language and ethos and pathos.

Martin Luther King wrote the “Letter From Birmingham Jail,” after an unfair proposal made by white clergymen. Their claims were that no negro should be allowed to establish or lead any protests. King replied directly to the clergymen, but used religious ties to establish himself as legitimate authority in the eyes of his audience, to show the inconveniences of black people in America, to justify his cause, and to argue the necessity of the immediate action. In the passage King used both ethos and pathos.

Logos or logic, was used to give data and statistics such as the amount of bombing in Birmingham or the methods that Martin Luther King jr. uses to fight against segregation. Logos was used mostly when distinguishing between laws that cannot and should not be broken and laws that can be broken because those laws themselves are out of harmony with moral laws. Dr. Martin Luther King then furthers

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. made a historical speech about equality and how the U.S. was unjust in 1963, which is still relevant today. This speech is called the “I Have a Dream Speech”. Dr. King uses many literary devices to appeal to his audience. The way that he presented this speech to the audience is so that anyone that may not be as educated as he is would understand just what he is saying and what he means. The audience could relate to Dr. King because they feel the same way about segregation and the mistreatment of Americans at this time. The use of imagery, allusion, symbolism, metaphors, and other literary devices demonstrate ethos, pathos, and logos by grabbing the audience’s attention to understand Dr. King’s message and purpose. They are strategically incorporated to make this amazing speech to deliver a message about freedom. His purpose shook the audience to its roots and led the way to end segregation.

In Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s two very famous pieces of work called “I have a dream”, and “Letter from Birmingham Jail”, he uses two main types of persuasive appeals. Those two persuasive appeals being logos and pathos. Within the letter and the speech, both appeal to their audience’s sense of justice by innate rights.

Bob Marley’s quote, “Better to die fighting for freedom then be a prisoner all the days of your life,” is very similar to the ideas of Martin Luther King Jr. in “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” Scilla Elworthy and her talk on “Fighting with Nonviolence,” and Manal al-Sharif in her talk called “A Saudi Women Who Dared to Drive.” Many people have dealt with oppression, but only waited for someone else to take action. The only way to win freedom is to get up and fight for the rights.