Pathos in MLK's "I Have a Dream" Speech

Many great orators give their speeches with visceral body language. They express the exigence of their topic by seeming like it is urgent, that there is little time to move to action. This strategy has the affect of making your audience believe that they have to move now or suffer the consequences, which are laid out by the orator. This is an effective strategy, but MLK sparingly used it.

MLK would use pathos in his speeches to move his audience but he would never seem anything but patient and poised. He would relay to his audience the feeling that this legislation, the civil rights act, was bound to pass. A feeling of contained excitement came over the crown, because they knew exactly what they needed to do. They needed to protest and gather, but they knew that doing so would bring about the rightful change America needed.

-Garrett Fitzgerald