Barack Obama and World Peace

In a world that is becoming increasingly interconnected, it is relevant to examine the situations that foster peace and harmony, so as to play them up in preference to the situations that foster strife and division. In talking about peace from a communication standpoint, it is relevant to talk about speechmaking, and this work treats rhetorical criticism as a research method. Barack Obama's receipt of the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize was a situation that was not simply interesting, but also cogent in regard to the understanding of human efforts to broker peace in this interconnected world. The way we understand peace in the context of human efforts at its procurement is a field that is virgin, and this contribution to scholarship in that area is consequently justified. Any effort at contributing to this field will perennially be justified, because of the need for peace. The age of war should necessarily give way to one of peace, and the understanding of how peace comes about is a step in the right direction to that giving way. This thesis helps to make that step by presenting a notable proponent of world peace and examining his rhetorical efforts in helping bring about such global peace.