Abstract
The Rev. Dr. Benjamin Elijah Mays delivered the final eulogy of his student and friend, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., on April 9, 1968 at Morehouse College. This rhetorical speech addresses the cultural trauma of King’s assassination by persuading the audience to continue King’s legacy, the nonviolent Civil Rights movement for all of humanity. Also, Mays’ eulogy engages the communal grief of the African American community mourning the loss of their leader. As such, Mays models the Black preaching response to cultural trauma, which derives from Jeffery Alexander’s Social Theory of Trauma. The Black preaching response consists of the following sermonic components: the identification of the pain, the identification of the victim, the characterization of the relation of the trauma victim to the wider audience, the attribution of responsibility, and the redemption of the victim through the invitation of hope.
First Page
20
Last Page
29
Recommended Citation
McDonald, Nicole D.. "Black Preaching as a Public Address to Cultural Trauma: The Eulogy of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.." Sermon Studies 8.1 (2025) : 20-29. https://mds.marshall.edu/sermonstudies/vol8/iss1/3
