Analyse the Text of the Speech, Paying Particular...

In no more than 2, 250 words, analyse the text of the speech, paying particular attention to the following features of its semantics and lexical structure: use of metaphor, semantic field, text type, register, intertextuality. Martin Luther King was one of the main leaders of the American civil rights movement, who fought against discrimination, and made a powerful appeal for justice and equality. Looking back to the history, in 1963 the America was divided into black and white population due to racism across countries. Namely, not only institutions such as schools and churches were separated but also public places like restaurants, libraries, cafes and even toilets. Besides, all the Black people, who were also called ‘Negroes’ were†¦show more content†¦Namely through such composition of words, King wants the crowd to understand the seriousness of racism issue and experience its effect in terms of another semantic field, which in this case is a money matter. Using such metaphors, people are more likely to understand what his intentions are and also the hidden, deep meanings, which they convey and which are linked to the Civil Rights issue. According to professor of Philosophy, J ohn Searle, metaphor is based on the â€Å"understanding and experiencing one thing in terms of another† or as Joseph Priestley, who was an 18th century popular British theologian and natural philosopher, claimed that metaphor is defined as: â€Å"simile contracted to its smallest dimensions.† Not surprisingly, metaphors are widely used by poets, what gives an opportunity to readers analyse and interpret the hidden meaning of words. This linguistic process gives also a pleasure to potential readers in discovering what the author really meant by certain words or expressions. There are many uses of metaphor and as stated in the article â€Å"The many Uses of Metaphor† written by Karsten Harries: â€Å"successful metaphors reveal reality and can thus claim to be true.† The text of the â€Å"I have a dream† historic speech is made up of many metaphors, which are used in various ways. In addition, there are also numerous words used to create metaphors, which connotations are associated with negative feelings, for instance: