Obama' speech.

OBAMA’S ESSAY Antonio Jesús González Montilla

1. Pay especial attention to all the sound patterns that are recurrent. What do you think these are used for?

In this text, we can see the repetition of the sound sentences, words or paragraphs very clear. The firs paragraph finishes with “there is something happening in America”, and the next paragraph is beginning with the samestructure “there is something happening...”; in the third paragraph we see the same, it starts with “there is something happening..” and in the fourth as well. This keep our attention in order we to expect what is happening in America, what the secret is, and finally he discovers in the fourth paragraph what we expected to know, Change is what is happening.
Focus on other important structures wecan see how he uses “our new majority” in the following three paragraphs making participants to everyone of this new America that has just born.
In all the text we can see how it is used the pronoun we, and our, first person plural, what makes an idea of union, an idea of our aim is the same, we have to be joined for the cause and we can’t do it without your help. We can see this in theparagraph number nine, in which he says “it’s not just about what I will do as President. It’s also about what you, the people who love this country, can do to change it”.
But, with any doubt, the most important structure of the text, is founding in the last part of it, and this is: yes, we can. These 3 words have a lot of importance, because they become like a slogan, like a supporter shout. Thispart contains everything to success, a positive particle, Yes, a first pronoun person plural, we, and an important verb, can, which remarks the positivity of the sentence.
With all of this we can see that this text is written to be listened in an auditory, and probably due to all the structures, and words mentioned before, can cause an effusive feeling of positivity in the person that listensit.

2. Study the metaphors used in the text. Try to classify them into notional categories, and explain the potential reasons why the author prefers them and their impact on the reader.

In the fourth paragraph we can see a word that if it’s not a real metaphor, it’s an important adjective that prepares the next metaphor; this is darkness, which is referred to long political and makesyou think about the “division and distraction that has clouded Washington”. Here Obama is critiquing the actual political way of thinking that they have in the country and which has caused a lot of problems to all the people.
In the paragraph number 10 he says “battle” to the political competition, it’s sounds like a part of a war and makes the listener the idea of he is going to fight withall he has and we can understand the famous sentence “until I don’t have any droop of blood”.
We see as well, in the paragraph number 13 after the second, yes, we can, how he says “darkest of nights”, if it’s not a real metaphor because the night is dark, this darkest has a different connotation; it refers to that nights what we should feel shame for, in which the slaves and the abolitionistwere treated as animals.
In the paragraph number 15 we can focus on “a president who chose the moon as our new frontier; and a King who took us to the mountaintop and pointed the way to the Promised Land”. From my point of view he is talking about Kennedy and Washington, 2 of the most important presidents of U.S.A; the first one started with the Apollo expeditions to the Moon and to discoverssomething more about the universe, and the other one, is the creator of the country and its firs president.

3. Which religious references can you spot in the speech? Are they relevant in any sense?

The metaphor of the paragraph number 15, “the King who took us to the mountaintop and pointed the way to the Promised Land” has a religious reference because it compares to Washington with...