Cultural Studies paper by Sherwood, Peter
Aspects of Kossuth's Oratory: His Final Speech in English in the USA, June 21, 1852. (Accepted)
Type of Abstract (select):Abstract (max. 250 words):
Aspects of Kossuth's Oratory: His Final Speech in English in the USA, June 21, 1852.
Lajos Kossuth astounded audiences sometimes numbered in the hundreds of thousands both in England and the USA with his extraordinary English-language performances during his political-cum-fundraising tour of these countries in 1851-1852, when he is said to have made more than 600 public speeches in America alone. While the political aspects of his activities in the Anglo-Saxon world have been extensively chronicled by historians both in Hungary and the USA, and the mythopoeia of his acquisition of English has also been explored in some detail, less attention has been paid to the specifically linguistic aspects of his rhetoric. This paper focuses on what was probably Kossuth's final English-language speech in the USA, attempting to shed light on his rhetorical techniques as well as on some of his hitherto unidentified sources and the remarkable ways in which he re-purposed them.
Brief Professional Bio (max. 100 words):
I spent 42 years teaching mainly Hungarian language and culture at the Universities of London and North Carolina at Chapel Hill. I have compiled bilingual dictionaries, written a textbook, and published dozens of articles and reviews, as well as translating numerous works from Hungarian, including novels, short stories, excerpts from books, poems, memoirs, and film scripts, among other genres. Awards received include the Officer's Cross of the Hungarian Order of Merit (2007) and, most recently, the László Országh Prize of the Hungarian Society for the Study of English (2016).