Abstract
From shortly after World War 11 until the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, the United States and the Soviet Union were enmeshed in what came to be known historically as the Cold War. This battle characterized both the political relations and the political rhetoric between the two nations. It was during the height of the Cold War that John F. Kennedy pursued a nuclear test ban treaty with the Soviet Union. Towards this end, he delivered a commencement address at American University on June 10, 1963. This thesis analyzes the strategies used by Kennedy to achieve this goal, and approaches the address from the context of Cold War rhetoric. By responding to the constraints provided to him by the Cold War, Kennedy maximized the potential persuasiveness of his address and offered a new insight to his audiences concerning the possibility of peace between the United States and the Soviet Union.
Joyce, Kelly J (1997). Paving the road to peace: John F. Kennedy's American University address. Master's thesis, Texas A&M University. Available electronically from
https : / /hdl .handle .net /1969 .1 /ETD -TAMU -1997 -THESIS -J69.