奥巴马就职演讲的修辞分析

修辞学期末作业

——关于奥巴马就职演讲的修辞格分析

11级英语7班

1105020224

张骁

奥巴马就职演讲的修辞分析

一、头韵(Alliteration)

1.Time and again these men and women struggled and sacrificed and worked till their hands were raw so that we might live a better life.

此句中struggled与sacrificed和live与life两组头韵，前一组再现了先辈们浴血奋战的场景和他们无私奉献的精神，后一组则把一组对美好明天的向往生动地勾勒了出来。

2.We remain the most prosperous, powerful nation on Earth.

此句中prosperous与powerful这组头韵，描绘出了美利坚合众国的繁荣富强，头韵的修辞使表达非常具有感染力。

3.But our time of standing pat, of protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant decision-that time has surely passed.

此句中pat，protecting与putting三个以“P”开头为头韵的词放在一起，给人以巧夺天工之感。

4.We will restore science to its rightful place, and wield technology’s wonders to raise health care’s quality and lower its cost.

此句中wield与wonders的运用浑然天成，运用地非常精准。5....whether it can help families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified.

此句中三组头韵：families和find，decent与dignified,care与can的运用不仅有效地表达了评判一个政府的标准，而且在演讲中演讲极富韵律，让人过耳不忘。

6.To the people of poor nations, we pledge to work alongside you to make your farms flourish and let clean waters flow.

这三个以“f”开头的词恰当地运用了头韵这个修辞格，生动地流露了美利坚人民帮助贫穷国家人民的行动与热情。

7.It is the firefighter's courage to storm a stairway filled with smoke...

此句同意是三个具有头韵效果的词叠用，描绘出了消防队员勇敢无畏冲进浓烟火海的场景。

8.This is the price and the promise of citizenship.

两个名词都以“p”开头连用，是头韵修辞较为普通的运用。

二、元音韵(Assonance)

1....and each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet.

2.They saw America as bigger than the sum of our individual ambitions; greater than all the differences of birth or wealth or faction.

元音韵在本演讲稿的例子很多，作为较早就出现的修辞格，元音韵的使用增添了文章字里行间的意境美令人感觉旋律优美，读来令人过目不忘，是非常容易模仿使用的一种修辞格。

三、辅音韵(Consonance)

1. greater than all the differences of birth or wealth or faction.

2. grateful for the trust you have bestowed, mindful of the sacrifices borne by our ancestors.

3. Homes have been lost; jobs shed; businesses shuttered.

4. We will build the roads and bridges, the electric grids and digital lines that feed our commerce and bind us together.

辅音韵同元音韵一样，是跟元音韵相类似的一种修辞格。同样也能给人带来韵律的对称，语音的悦耳以及表达的节奏感的效果。

四、反复(Repetition)

1.Our workers are no less productive than when this crisis began. Our minds are no less inventive, our goods and services no less needed than they were last week or last month or last year.

此句中三个“no less”的连续使用描写出了在金融危机时候我们的工人，我们的创造力，我们的商品和服务仍旧保持着一流的水平。这样的反复使用，不仅增加了韵律美，更加强化了对他们的赞美之情。2.The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works - whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage...

此句中三个“whether”的连用使得语义更为明晰，语气也得以递进，强调出了我们的政府该做什么和是什么的问题，让人听来热血沸腾。

3.Our challenges may be new. The instruments with which we meet them may be new.

两个“may be new”的连用是欲扬先抑的描写手法的较好的体现，目的是为了引出下文。

4.on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather

seize gladly...

重复使用“duties”一词使其得以强调和突出，深刻地描写出了在负责任的新时代我们肩负的责任，让我们更加认同自己所担负的使命。

五、首语重复(Anaphora）

1. the God-given promise that all are equal, all are free, and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness.

2. our goods and services no less needed than they were last week or last month or last year.

首语重复是反复的一种特殊情况，这两句中“all”和“last”的三次重复出现，使层次结构变得更为明显，使语言富有回环美、复沓美、节奏美和旋律美。

六、排比(Parallelism)

1.I stand here today humbled by the task before us, grateful for the trust you have bestowed, mindful of the sacrifices borne by our ancestors.

这是奥巴马总统演讲的首句，以“humbled, grateful, mindful”三个平行的形容词来描写自己当时的心里状态，把自己的诚惶诚恐和感恩戴德之情抒发的淋漓尽致。

2.On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord. On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn out dogmas, that for far too long have strangled our politics.

“on this day”引出的两个排比句先声夺人，让听众清晰地感知了演