our, we, us, nation, and the people. Another important aspect of the language was Lincoln’s selection of simple, mostly one or two syllable words. He was speaking to a diverse crowd containing not only politicians, military officers and press, but also the families of those who had died. Common everyday people who were probably rather uneducated individuals. Lincoln made sure that his words could reach everyone by being sure their denotative meaning could be understood by all. It doesn’t matter what great message words can convey if the words seem to be another language. And since those families were the most important segment of the audience, Lincoln choose his diction based mostly on them. One might suppose that such limited vocabulary would create a dull unmoving speech, but Lincoln was able to avoid this in several ways. One was his use of antitheses. For instance the juxtaposition of preservation and new birth of freedom. Also mortal and immortal: “those who gave there lives” and “that nation might live…shall not perish from the earth”. And “the world will little note, nor long remember” contrasting to “it can never forget”. Lincoln also puts to good use emotion-laden words such as: fathers, liberty, war, died, dedicate, consecrate, struggle, nobly, honored, God and freedom. Appealing to emotion is the strongest form of persuasion and “The Gettysburg Address” is great example of its usage and effectiveness. To further add to the emotional appeal Lincoln’s speech has an almost poetic quality to it. The speech seems to have a melodic flow from beginning to end starting with “Four score and seven years ago” rather than 87 years ago which is a much more blunt and bland way of saying it. There is constant repetition of words so each sentence connects to the other even through changes of ideas. This poetic flow enhances the others tones of sp...
