Essay on Dr. Martin Luther King's Famous "I Have a Dream"

Martin Luther King Jr. uses rhetorical devices such as repetition, metaphors, and experiences in his speech, "I Have a Dream," to give hope to the audience's cries for Civil Rights. The most obvious rhetorical device King uses in his speech is repetition. King keeps exclaiming, "'I have a dream...,'" in his speech. This allows King's audience to believe that their dream is worth fighting for. In addition, this allows the listeners to visualize their dream, indirectly giving hope to them: what you can visualize is what you can obtain.
Dr. King also uses metaphors to cheer on the cry for Civil Rights. King claims that "America has given the Negro people a bed check, a check [that] has come back marked 'insufficient funds.'" King further extends this metaphor by exclaiming that they have come to Washington to "cash this check...that will give [them] upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice." This fills the listeners with hope, as attaining Civil Rights should be as easy as cashing a check. All they have to do is to keep fighting and not to give up. In addition, King uses experiences to fuel the cries for Civil Rights. Both King and his audience "have been the veterans of creative suffering." Some of the participants, including Dr. King himself, have "come fresh from narrow jail cells" and have been the "victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality." Even to come to the speech, the Negros couldn't "gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities." Even the right to vote is useless: "A Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in Ney York believes he has nothing for which to vote." All these statements are experiences that all the Negros share, that they have been through. King is telling the audience that even he has been through these "great trials and tribulations." This makes the audience feel that King understands them and is one of them. As a result, the audience listens closer to Dr. King's speech. King's speech was very effective in both promoting Civil Rights and replenishing hope for the fighters. However, Dr King's efforts were not in vain; African Americas did eventually obtain Civil Rights. If not for King's great speech, which was emphasized by his use oh repetition, metaphors, and experiences, Negros in America might've satisfied their "thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred" or lost all hope as opposed to succeeding in obtaining their rights.