Commentary on The keynote adress to the Beijing World Conference on women

Rhetoric is the art of effective and persuasive language. Good rhetoric is structured upon the modes of persuasion; ethos, pathos, and logos, which takes into account the relationship between the speaker, audience and subject (subject statement). This will be demonstrated by analysing the rhetorical techniques being skilfully utilized in Aung San Suu Kyi’s speech, 'The keynote Address to the Beijing World Conference on women". Aung, the leader of the National League of Democracy in Burma and globally known as a political activist for democracy and human rights, has been awarded several prizes, including the Nobel Peace Prize. But due to her international influence and strong ideas, she has been sentenced to house arrest several times. The speech was delivered on 31 August 1995 via video because Aung had just been released from almost 6 years house arrest and feared that leaving Burma to Beijing would result in the banning her return. Through the use of numerous persuasive techniques, Aung Yang Suu Kyi has developed a very emotional speech that appeals to ethos, pathos and logos, and achieves at manipulating the audience to believe and adopt her point of view. Ethos is the author's ability to reveal credibility through the tone established. The speech starts off by saying how it is 'a wonderful but daunting task' that has fallen on Aung herself to open up this forum, 'the greatest concourse of women' as she tries to voice the 'common hopes which unites us in all our splendid diversity'. Through the use of such powerful emotive and inclusive language, she expresses her excitement with an upbeat positive tone, demonstrating to the audience that she is a highly credible person to be selected as a representative. A personal anecdote in the second paragraph directly explains the context and background information on how the deliverance of the speech is via video. This reveals her powerful political standings and further establishes a personal connection with the