Thursday, January 22, 2009

Analysis of Barack Obama's Inaugural Speech

I ran a word frequency analysis of Barack Obama's speech. It shows the key words that define the inspirational theme of a speech. Here are the words: OUR, WE, NATION, ALL, AMERICA, EVERY, PEOPLE, TODAY, WORLD, NOW, GENERATION, WORK, COMMON, SPIRIT, POWER, HARD, SEEK, CRISIS, PEACE, GREATER. Having words like these in a speech by another leader would probably have a similar effect if delivered well. 

Is speech-writing art or science? How would a speech made by an automated speech generator compare to a hand crafted speech?

Unique words:884 Total words:2397 Freq. Word 129 THE 113 AND 81 OF 70 TO 67 OUR 62 WE 50 THAT 48 A 36 IS 25 IN 24 THIS 23 US 23 FOR 22 ARE 20 BUT 19 IT 19 WILL 17 THEY 17 ON 16 NOT 16 HAVE 14 WHO 14 HAS 13 CAN 13 WITH 12 NATION 12 S 12 BE 12 YOU 11 THOSE 11 NEW 11 AS 11 OR 10 THEIR 9 SO 9 THESE 9 ALL 9 AMERICA 8 BY 8 THAN 8 BECAUSE 8 EVERY 8 WHAT 8 BEEN 8 ITS 8 MUST 8 AT 7 NO 7 DO 7 WHEN 7 PEOPLE 7 LESS 7 TODAY 7 WORLD 7 LET 6 NOW 6 CANNOT 6 TOO 6 GENERATION 6 WORK 6 COMMON 6 TIME 5 ONLY 5 NOR 5 KNOW 5 FROM 5 DAY 5 MORE 5 WAS 5 SPIRIT 4 THROUGH 4 POWER 4 HARD 4 SEEK 4 CRISIS 4 UP 4 FAR 4 LONG 4 MEET 4 MEN 4 COME 4 WHETHER 4 WHICH 4 THEM 4 BEFORE 4 END 4 WOMEN 4 WORDS 4 THINGS 4 PEACE 4 GREATER