Rhetorical Analysis Of Obama’s State Of The Union Address 2016 From The Perspective Of Kenneth Burke’s New Rhetoric

State of the Union Address is a public speech annually delivered to the congress by the president of the United States of America which is essential for the president to win the support from the congress and the audiences.This thesis intends to make an analysis of State of the Union Address 2016 from the perspective of Kenneth Burke’s new rhetoric.The focus of the study is to reveal the rhetorical process of public speech discourse and rhetorical motives embodied in the discourse.In this thesis,Burke’s ideas of new rhetoric are studied from three aspects: rhetoric of identification,dramatism,and logology,which constitute three dimensions of the framework proposed.Identification analysis focuses on three major identification strategies:identification through common sense of values,identification through antithesis,and identification through inaccuracy.These strategies are often employed in political speech to move the speech audience to identify with the speaker and the speech content.In dramatistic analysis,the discourse of state of the union address is analyzed in terms of ratios of act,agent,agency,scene and purpose,demonstrating the speaker’s motive of influencing the audience.With the vocabulary of logological analysis of state of the union address studies show the discourse constructs hierarchy,creates principle of perfection and marks mystery to drive the audience to identify with the speech.This thesis has introduced Burke’s new rhetoric into the rhetorical critique of state of the union address,which aims to help people better interpret state of the union address.It also provides some meaningful evidences for the application of Kenneth Burke’s new rhetoric.Meanwhile,this study is also meaningful both in language teaching and in language learning.