A New Beginning, Obama's Speech in Cairo

Abstract

This report focuses on the linguistic approaches in the Speech ”A New Beginning”, given by President of the United States, Barack Obama in Cairo on June 4th 2009. The speech intended to minimize the gap between the Muslim World and the USA, and serve as a new opportunity for a better relationship between the two sides. Through a critical discourse analysis we intended to shed light upon the methods used by Obama to gain and keep the attention and goodwill of the audience. Since a speech like that is not just carried out without careful planning, it has been very important to choose the right words in order to deliver the message with the desired effect. We came to discover that a great amount of politeness had to be used because of the fragile relationship and the difference in the social norms. Being inexperienced in giving speeches of this kind, it was necessary to choose every word very carefully, and many consultants were helping out writing the speech. Obama recognized and admitted that the task to mend the relationship would not be easy, and stated in a respectful way that it would take a sustained effort for both sides to make any real progress occur from this first step.