The Declaration of Independence is perhaps the most masterfully written state paper of Western civilization. As Moses Coit Tyler noted almost a century ago, no assessment of it can be complete without taking into account its extraordinary merits as a work of political prose style. Although many scholars have recognized those merits, there are surprisingly few sustained studies of the stylistic artistry of the Declaration. This essay seeks to illuminate that artistry by probing the discourse microscopically -- at the level of the sentence, phrase, word, and syllable. The University of Wisconsin's Dr. Stephen E. Lucas meticulously analyzes the elegant language of the 235-year-old charter in a distillation of
this comprehensive study.
More on the Declaration: full transcript and
ultra-high-resolution scan,
a transcript and scan of Jefferson's annotated rough draft,
the little-known royal rebuttal,
a thorough history of the parchment itself,
a peek at the archival process, a reading of the document
by the people of NPR and
by a group of prominent actors,
H. L. Mencken's "American" translation,
Slate's Twitter summaries, and
a look at the fates of the 56 signers.
posted by Rhaomi
on Jul 4, 2011 -
72 comments
It is not our role to take power. It is our role to make the powerful frightened of us. And that's what we've forgotten. Give up that dream! Chris Hedges talks neoliberalism and neofeudalism, the civil rights movement, Camden, Obama, Clinton, Tea Parties, moral nihilism, inverted totalitarianism and corpocracy, NAFTA, welfare reform, health care, labor, poverty, Yugoslavia, post-industrial capitalism, economic crisis, imperial collapse, socialism, and democracy, among other things.
[more inside]
posted by gerryblog
on Apr 24, 2010 -
51 comments
The Obama Coalition "
These general findings suggest the possibility that the political strength of voters whose convictions are perhaps best described as Social Democratic in the European sense is reaching a significant level in the United States. With effective organization and mobilization, such voters are positioned to set the agenda in the Democratic Party in the near future."
posted by Glibpaxman
on Apr 4, 2010 -
37 comments
Now we're faced with a supposedly
democratic Russia where the opposition parties are
established, crushed, united, their leadership changed, all at the behest of the president. China, now clearly
a capitalist state, albeit one without the democratic trimmings, still calls
itself communist. Vietnam has
gone much the same way.
Some things remain the same, though. America's still
meddling in Latin America,
just like it did during the Cold War. The US Army is also fighting a guerilla resistance in Iraq, its leaders apparently ignorant of
the lessons of history, yet accusing others of
exactly that. It's just like the 60s, when it was just as obvious
who had learnt lessons and who hadn't.
posted by imperium
on Aug 30, 2006 -
48 comments
At this challenging time for President Bush, let us
reminisce about the
system that
elected him. Will the next election be different? Do you want it to be? What are you going to do about it
?
posted by Pretty_Generic
on Sep 12, 2005 -
61 comments
