Tony Blair "The challenge of change" // rhetorical devices

0 00Hey, 00I'll have to sit a very important pre-exam on Wednesday next week which is concerned with political speeches. That's why 00I'd like you to correct this essay and to (is this "to" necessary?) give your opinion about it, especially in terms of style. I'd really appreciate tips on what to improve, since 00I'm not that happy with the job I did: there is sort of little variety and it doesn't sound very "elegant" I'm afraid... 02br
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01u00Outline the rhetorical and stylistic devices Blair uses and analyse how they support his argumentation02u02br
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00The stylistic level is formal: Blair tends to use words that derive from the latin language like “transform” (l. 5), “continuous” (l. 6), “ideological” (l. 17) and “evaluate” (l. 22). At the same time his register is quite emotive, though, employing stirring terms like “most dramatic” (ll. 1,2), “unpredictable” (l. 2), “breakneck speed” (l. 6) or “breathtaking development” (l. 3) to move the audience.01span02span02br
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00Tony Blair opens his speech with the words “My friends” (l. 1) pointing out his apparent concern for the listeners, hence seeking confidence. In his speech Blair frequently uses the words “we”, “us”, “our” (ll. ...) and thus expresses his solidarity with the audience which is supposed to result in a general feeling of community.02br
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00By means of rhetorical question (ll. 21,22) the Prime Minister emphasises the incalculable dangers of technological progress within the process of globalisation, for we do not even comprehend “the power that [that] information puts at our disposal” (l. 21). Yet another function is simply to maintain the audience’s interest.02br
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00The Prime Minister reinforces his arguments as he uses superlatives (e.g. l. 1 “most dramatic”, l. 7 “hardest things”, ll. 9,10 “greatest [...] upheaval”) to persuade the audience. He makes a point by overstating it.02br
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00In order to stress the large extent of “fear and change” that Globalization “has brought” (ll. 26, 27) mankind Blair structures each of the corresponding examples linguistically similar (“Children who could”, “who grow up”, “parents who struggle”, “a world where”) which enables the reader both to recognize more readily the likeness of content and to keep it better in mind – this stylistic device is referred to as parallelism.02br
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00Similar parallel structures can be found repeatedly in the speech to place emphasis on what is being said, for instance in line 24 (“for our destinies, for what we understand”) and in the very last line where he reachs the conclusion: “Resist change: futile. Let it happen: dangerous. So, the third way, if you like, manage it.”02br
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00The run-on sentence from line 27 to 31 is particularly striking and underlines the content: the thought is not limited by sentence length.02br
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00Furthermore the orator quite often employs enumeration to be more persuasive, e.g. “how we develop a dynamic market, an intelligent state, an active civil society” (ll. 18,19).02br
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00Thanks in advance! 05002br
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