The Secret Life Of Pronouns, By James W. Pennebaker
1433 Words6 Pages
Michaela Garcia
English 1010
Professor Dolan
12 September 2015
Behind the Speech: Hillary Clinton
What is the easiest way to read someone’s mind? In the book The Secret Life of Pronouns, James W. Pennebaker discusses the importance of our words and how they unveil information about our character. Based on the use of pronouns, prepositions, articles, etc., we can determine many things about the writer such as their gender, the emotion the writer is experiencing, their intelligence level, whether they’re telling the truth or not, and their age. Using the knowledge and techniques that Pennebaker wrote about we can analyze anyone and everyone. Hillary Clinton is a candidate for the 2016 Presidential Election. She has been in the public eye for…show more content… The main point of this speech is fighting for and bringing attention to women’s rights. She talks about women from all around being wrongfully treated and not getting the help or support that they need and deserve. Hillary also states “If there is one message that echoes forth from this conference, let it be that human rights are women’s rights and women’s right are human rights once and for all” (Hillary). This statement is the most important line in the entire speech discussing that human rights and women’s rights are one in the same and should both be treated and acknowledged the…show more content… Prepositions are used to show the relationship between words. In her speech Hillary used over 250 words that were prepositions. This is the most common part of speech that Hillary used. A large number of prepositions are most commonly seen in males. Even with all of the prepositions and articles, Hillary used function words more than content words. Because of this we can tell she has a high social skill. This may be why she doesn’t use hedge phrases that often. Hedge phrases are sentences that usually start with “I think” or “I believe”. Women most commonly use hedge phrases. However, Hillary Clinton uses just one throughout her speech. In Pennebaker’s book he mentions, “Consistent with the greater social interests of women, it is not surprising that they are more likely to use hedge than are men” (Pennebaker 45). Hillary is unlike the women in this sense. She doesn’t use hedge phrases as often as the average female. Hillary does this to show more masculinity, social experience and confidence when talking about women’s rights. She wants people to feel that she is just as good as any man in