Pericles’ “Funeral Orientation” and MLK’s “I Have a Dream”

Throughout the years, people have made speeches that have left cities, states and countries in awe. Even though these speeches covered a wide variety of topics, they all had methods of making them memorable. One tactic that people use in speeches is making the community feel superior while making other people look terrible. Another way is making the audience feel comfortable by making them laugh and talking about familiar topics. Whatever the style may be, Pericles’ “Funeral Oration” speech and Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” have stuck out more than others.

In Pericles’ speech, he is supposed to be talking about mourning the dead people at the funeral. Instead, he said that they shouldn’t be mourned but should be cheered for. He told the audience that these deceased people sacrificed their lives for Athens and should be congratulated. He then made the Athenians feel proud by saying how fantastic the city of Athens was. At one point he brags by saying, “For we have compelled every land and every sea to open a path for our valor, and have everyone planted eternal memorials of our friendship and of our enmity.” He also says, “Then, again, our military training is in many respects superior to that of our adversaries.

The other speech, “I Have a Dream”, Martin Luther King expresses his feelings in a dissimilar way. Unlike Pericles, Martin Luther King focuses on the segregation of black and white people in the United States. His main view was that he wants a nation where people can live together without violence and racism. He feels that all men no matter skin color, shape, size or religion are equal and deserve to be respected members of society. One of his methods of capturing the audience appeared when he said, “We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their selfhood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating “For Whites Only”.” Here, he talks about children because children are something that everyone in the crowd can relate to. Another method he used was making references to historical documents like the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.

These two speeches seemed both similar and different in content and in presentation. Pericles’ speech made people proud of where they lived, who they were, and what they did. This is much different than the segregation speech by MLK. In this speech, he makes the people of America feel bad about themselves because of the way they have acted in relationship to racism. Both speeches however, try to turn the current circumstances around in a constructive direction. MLK wants to make America into a country that treats its citizens with respect instead of one with unfairness. Like this, Pericles wants the people of Athens to feel motivated to fight instead of grieve of their recent losses.

It is clear that the speeches are delivered in very different times and societies, as the subject matter is a reflection of issues that the society feels are most important. Their methods are noticeably different because the people of these two times were more concentrated on different matters. These speeches are remembered because of how effectively they communicated the speaker’s message and affected those who heard them. It is obvious that both Pericles and MLK managed to astonish and impress their audiences by making the people feel connected to the issues.