What To The Slave Is The Fourth Of July
What to the Slave is the Fourth of July is a strong declaration of what July fourth and freedom means to Frederick Douglass. The people who asked him to speak speculated that he would speak of the wonderful freedom the fourth of July bring to him, but things took a turn in the opposite directs. Douglass conveys his opinions through his diction, rhetorical devices, and figurative language. Frederick Douglass used specific diction throughout his speech to convey his points. He uses words such as obdurate, gratitude, Jubilee, rejoice, mourn, rob, liberty, work, ignorant, beat, flay, and sunder. These words bring forward a great deal of emotion. The objective of his diction was to help them in someway grasp the emotional effect of things these
people didn’t experience first hand. Douglass knows these people don’t understand the effects slavery has on the people who had to live their whole life as a slave. The diction of Frederick Douglass was so full of emotion and anger, it could cut through glass. Douglass used many rhetorical devices throughout this speech. He uses a ton of ethos, pathos, and logos. Pathos was used with the words douglass chose. Towards the end Douglass said “Go search where you may, search where you will, roam through all the monarchies and despotisms of the old world, travel through South America, search out every abuse, and when you have found the last, lay your facts by the side of the everyday practices of this nation, and you will say with me, that, for revolting barbarity and shameless hypocrisy, America reigns without a rival.” This whole section is a combination of ethos, pathos and logos. He uses this section to try and persuade them to go out and do their research, to search the world for things that he went through and nothing could compare.
people didn’t experience first hand. Douglass knows these people don’t understand the effects slavery has on the people who had to live their whole life as a slave. The diction of Frederick Douglass was so full of emotion and anger, it could cut through glass. Douglass used many rhetorical devices throughout this speech. He uses a ton of ethos, pathos, and logos. Pathos was used with the words douglass chose. Towards the end Douglass said “Go search where you may, search where you will, roam through all the monarchies and despotisms of the old world, travel through South America, search out every abuse, and when you have found the last, lay your facts by the side of the everyday practices of this nation, and you will say with me, that, for revolting barbarity and shameless hypocrisy, America reigns without a rival.” This whole section is a combination of ethos, pathos and logos. He uses this section to try and persuade them to go out and do their research, to search the world for things that he went through and nothing could compare.