Inaugural Address--Post #1 (academic): We, You, Us, Them

With the inauguration of the 45th president, we begin the work of this blog in earnest.  Let us not engage in rhetorical analysis out of fear, but let us not fear to engage in rhetorical analysis.

The next several posts will deal with the inaugural address given by Trump.  Rather than one long journal-article-length post, we'll go through the speech in sections, looking at both how it is similar and markedly different than other speeches in the genre.

I'll also make a point from here on out of identifying posts as "academic" or "editorial" in tone.  The former will be relatively neutral, semi-scholarly glosses or analyses of texts.  The latter will be more informal responses from a political point of view.  This post is in the "academic" category.

Below is the opening section of the speech, with comments inserted.

Chief Justice Roberts, President Carter, President Clinton, President Bush, President Obama, fellow Americans, and people of the world: Thank you.

This is a fairly typical opening. One slight deviation is Trump addressing "fellow Americans" rather than fellow citizens.  The mention of "people of the world" in the opening is unusual, although it directly echoes the conclusion of JFK's inaugural address that overtly broadens the audience to address people beyond America's boundaries.

We, the citizens of America, are now joined in a great national effort to rebuild our country and to restore its promise for all of our people.

Trump makes an initial move to identify himself as a "citizen"--as a member of the same collective as those to who he addresses his remarks.

The line overtly echoes a line from the Gettysburg Address: "Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure", an attempt to parallel a movement he sees himself leading to the Civil War. 

Together, we will determine the course of America and the world for years to come.
We will face challenges. We will confront hardships. But we will get the job done.

This is one of the final times in the inaugural address that Trump speaks of a collective without an overt enemy or opposition.

Every four years, we gather on these steps to carry out the orderly and peaceful transfer of power, and we are grateful to President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama for their gracious aid throughout this transition. They have been magnificent.

This has become an almost mandatory move in inaugural addresses: invoking the occasion as a celebration of the peaceful transfer of power.  

Today's ceremony, however, has very special meaning. Because today we are not merely transferring power from one administration to another, or from one party to another -- but we are transferring power from Washington, D.C. and giving it back to you, the American People.

At this point in the address, Trump's tone changes decisively and permanently toward a more Manichean worldview.  It ties the previously mentioned standard invocation of the peaceful transfer of power together with the nearly-as-standard mention of the occasion transcending party (something that is first invoked by Jefferson and mentioned in a number of other memorable inaugurals, including JFK's).  But then, it changes, setting up a dichotomy that structures the rest of the speech, setting Washington D.C. (used as a synecdoche for the federal government) at odds with "the people."  This is the contrast that will shape the rest of the address and make it quite unlike (and in some cases absolutely antithetical) to other inaugurals, particularly those considered examples of "great" speeches.

More on this in the next post.