An analysis of linguistic features in the selected speeches of Bishop Kleopas Dumeni in the pre-independence era in Namibia

Abstract

Linguistic features were used by Bishop Kleopas Dumeni of Evangelical Lutheran Church in Namibia (ELCIN) in the pre-independence era to persuade the audience to support the struggle for independence. Bishop Kleopas Dumeni used linguistic devices in an attempt to convince his target audience that the Namibians suffered a great deal at the hands of the colonial authorities. Thus international community support was desired to break the shackles of colonialism. Although Bishop Kleopas Dumeni employed various linguistic features in his speeches as a tool to whip up support for struggle for independence of Namibia, his language choices were never subjected to a critical examination to unravel their contribution to the effectiveness of the speeches. This paper thus examines how Bishop Dumeni used linguistic devices in his speeches to appeal to his audience as well as the effects these features had on the audience to support the struggle for Namibian independence. The paper is pegged on Aristotelian theory to reveal how language choice affects the three appeals of Aristotle namely, ethos, logos and pathos. Content analysis was used to deconstruct the selected speeches of Bishop Dumeni thereby identifying and evaluating the linguistic features in the speeches. The conclusion from this investigation is that Bishop Kleopas Dumeni effectively used the linguistic devices to woo his audience to his side to support in his efforts to end the wickedness of colonialism in Namibia.