Intention

“A More Perfect Union” by Barack Obama is a political speech delivered during the 2008 presidential campaign which focuses on the topic of racial relations in the US.

As a speaker, Barack Obama’s overall intention with the speech is to clarify the role race plays in his campaign and his position on racial relations in the US. The speaker’s message is that while racial tensions cannot be denied or overlooked, American society can still find unity in common goals: “I believe deeply that we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together, unless we perfect our union by understanding that we may have different stories, but we hold common hopes…” (ll. 40-43). Obama implies that he is the person who will be able to bridge the racial divide and focus on improving life for everyone in the US.

Within the speech, Obama pursues more specific aims connected with the topic and circumstances of the speech.

From the first part of the speech, we can infer that one of the speaker’s intentions is to help the American voters to know him better so that they realize that his background makes him suitable to represent all Americans and not only certain social and ethnic groups: ...