Text Analysis

1.Theme

By recalling his presidential election campaign, expressing his gratitude to his supporters, making promises and inspiring the audience to go through the difficulties with the whole nation, Obama emphasized the hope for a better future and a more perfect union.

2.Structure

1) Part 1 (Paras. 1-4 ): Opening part: hailing his election as a victory for American democracy.

2) Part 2 (Paras. 5-28 ): Body part: looking back on the 21-month-long campaign, expressing his gratitude to all those who have supported him, looking into his future role and calling on all Americans to join him in rebuilding the nation.

3) Part 3 (Paras. 29-31): Concluding part: Mapping out goals for the United States.

Questions:

1) How does Obama organize his speech?

He divides his speech into sections and treat each section in a different way. Each section is very different in content, and it is the switch of content which motivates a switch of style and renews the audience's motivation to listen.

2) How does Obama begin his speech stylistically?

He opens his speech with a if-clause with three who-clause embeddings.

3) How does the speech develop in paragraphs 2-4 ?

Each of the paragraphs after the first begins in the same parallel way.

4) How does the speech develop in paragraphs 5-28?

5) How does Obama end his speech?

6) How does Obama elaborate on his cherished theme --- the perfection of the Union ?

He expands epically through American space and time. Behind his speech were Lincoln’s First Inaugural, which moved anxiously over “every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land,” and his Second, which promised to “bind up the nation’s wounds.” Obama quoted from the end of the First Inaugural—“We are not enemies, but friends”—and the implication was clear: that the past eight years have been a kind of civil war.

7) How does Obama elaborate on his cherished theme---the perfection of the Union ?

He sought to bind those wounds by binding people together. First, he moved through the people—young and old, rich and poor, gay and straight.

Then he moved through the country—the back yards of Des Moines, the living rooms of Concord—ending, by way of the Gettysburg Address, with the earth: “from the millions of Americans who volunteered, and organized, and proved that, more than two centuries later, a government of the people, by the people and for the people has not perished from this Earth.”

And then he moved through time, using the epic novelist’s trick of a heroine as old as the century.

8) What dos Obama intend to illustrate by referring to Ann Nixon Cooper?

He intends to highlight the century change.

Ann Nixon Cooper, at the age of a hundred and six, had voted in Atlanta. Obama imagines all that she had seen: woman suffrage, the “despair in the dust bowl, and Depression across the land”; the start of the Second World War, when “bombs fell on our harbor” ; and “the buses in Montgomery, the hoses in Birmingham, a bridge in Selma.”

3.Further Discussion

1) What are Obama's rhetoric in delivering the victory speech?

2) Why does Obama refer to his own personal story in the speech?

3) How do you understand Obama’s perfection of the union?

●Writing Device

1.Anaphora

…who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy,…

2. Repetition

… block by block, brick by brick, calloused hand by calloused hand.

... new energy to harness, new jobs to be created, new schools to build...

To those who would tear the world down... To those who seek peace and security... And to all those who have wondered...

3.Parallelism

If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer.

4. Allusion

"put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day."

("the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice." )

Allusion:

A brief or implicit reference to something outside the text.

“we may not get there in one year or even one term, but America . . . I promise you—we as a people will get there,”

(“And I’ve seen the promised land. I may not get there with you.” )

“and where we are met with cynicism and doubt, and those who tell us that we can’t”

(“We are met on a great battlefield of that war.” )

“We are not enemies, but friends”

The sentence implies that the past eight years have been a kind of civil war.

Alluding to King’s “I have a dream”

‘beacon burning’

(“This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice.” )

5. Alliteration

Our campaign was not hatched in the halls of Washington - it began in the backyards of Des Moines and the living rooms of Concord and the front porches of Charleston.

And to all those who have wondered if America's beacon still burns as bright…

the occurrence of the same letter or sound at the beginning of adjacent or closely connected words

… from parliaments and palaces to those who are huddled around radios in the forgotten corners of our world - our stories are singular, …

6. Contrast

… where each of us resolves to pitch in and work harder and look after not only ourselves, but each other. Let us remember that if this financial crisis taught us anything, it's that we cannot have a thriving Wall Street while Main Street suffers - in this country, we rise or fall as one nation; as one people.

"We are not enemies, but friends…

It's the answer spoken by young and old, rich and poor, democrat and Republican, black, white, Hispanic, Asian, Native American, gay, straight, disabled and not disabled Americans who sent a message to the world that we have never been just a collection of individuals or a collection of Red States and Blue States: we are, and always will be, the United States of America.

… tonight we proved once more that the true strength of our nation comes not from the might of our arms or the scale of our wealth, but from the enduring power of our ideals: …

●Sentence Paraphrase

1. … put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day… (para. 4)

2. And I would not be standing here tonight without the unyielding support of my best friend for the last 16 years… (para. 8)

3. I was never the likeliest candidate for this office. We didn’t start with much money or many endorsements. Our campaign was not hatched in the halls of Washington… (para. 11)

4. It grew strength from the young people who rejected the myth of their generation’s apathy… (para. 12)

5. … braved the bitter cold and scorching heat. (para. 12)

6. At a time when women’s voices were silenced and their hopes dismissed… (para. 24)