An Analysis Of Rhetorical Situation In Obama’s2012Presidential Campaign Speeches

Barack Obama, the current president of United States of America, is an remarkable orator. His success in the two presidential election is largely attributed to his extraordinary oratory. His speeches always trigger the interests of the scholars at home and abroad. Most scholars explore Obama’s speeches from the perspective of linguistic. Recently, a few researchers study Obama’s speeches from the perspective of rhetoric, but their research angles mainly focus on the classic rhetorical studies, such as the figure of speech and Aristotelian three appeals. Therefore, there is still more room to explore Obama’s addresses in the light of the New Western Rhetoric.Based on American rhetoricians Lloyd Bitzer’s and Kenneth Burke’rhetorical situation theory, this thesis attempts to analyze Obama’s2012presidential campaign speeches with the qualitative approach. The theory of rhetorical situation was first put forward by Bitzer. He asserts that the emergence of rhetorical discourse relies on the existence of rhetorical situation and it requires the rhetor’s fitting response. Burke also made great contribution to the study of rhetorical situation. He states that rhetorical situation always exists and once people employ discourse, they inevitably enter rhetorical situation. In the process of studying rhetorical situation profoundly, Burke put forward the theory of identification, that is, in rhetorical activities, humans are always in the process of seeking identification, with discourse the rhetor cooperates with audiences and eliminates division so as to reach identification.Through the analysis of Obama’s three speeches, this thesis tries to answer the following questions:1) What are the exigences in the situation of2012presidential campaign and how Obama reacts to these exigences?2) How Obama influences audiences’ attitude and decision with rhetorical discourse?3) What constraints limit and influence the result of presidential campaign?Through the analysis, we can see that political speech relies on specific political situation and Obama is not only good at analyzing the exigence, audience and constraints where he is in, but also capable of adopting fitting discourse and rhetorical choices reacting to the situation. First, in the political situation exigences are the urgent problems such as economy, education, employment and health care insurance waiting to be coped with and Obama utilizes fitting discourse to remedy them. Next, Obama attaches importance to communication with audiences and makes him consubstantial with them so as to reduce division and reach identification. Last, Obama takes advantages of his role as rhetor in the rhetorical situation. By appropriately fashioning the ethos in correspondence with the situation and adopting effective logical proofs, he makes himself more convinced. Through the analysis, we have found that rhetorical situation can be used as a new research angle for the study of political speeches. The methodology and findings of this thesis can be drawn as reference for public speaking and its practices.