Pathos: Letter From Birmingham Jail

In reading Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “Letter From Birmingham Jail” he exemplified a few examples of pathos.

So what exactly is pathos? Pathos is emotional appeals to audience.

One great example of this would be when Dr. King, Jr. is explaining that he has to explain to his daughter that she is not allowed to go to the amusement park because of her color. I find this quite disturbing to hear that this young girl’s heart is broken and there is no reason for this.

Another example where he states, “… if you would watch them push and curse old Negro women and young Negro girls; if you would see them slap and kick old Negro men and young boys, if you would observe them, as they did on two occasions, refusing to give us food because we wanted to sing our grace together” (King 5). Here Dr. King Jr. is explaining to us the cruel punishment and this has pathos written all over it. Just being able to imagine, or even without trying to imagine, imagery floats across our minds as how this happened.

In his letter Dr. King Jr. cannot help but to write about these cruel events. Without any of this cruelty his letter alone cannot create the amount of immoral events that are going on.

Pathos is a great way to persuade people to see things in a more vivid image. Although, I don’t think it should always be used to persuade. I feel in his letter he is not using these things to persuade his writing, but rather the events persuade people to see for themselves. If that even makes sense.