Preview

Rhetorical Analysis Of A Modest Proposal

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
330 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Rhetorical Analysis Of A Modest Proposal
Rhetorical Analysis of “A Modest Proposal” An Anglican priest known for his political pamphlets, Jonathan Swift, in his essay, “A Modest Proposal”, suggests that the infants of poor mothers should be sold as food on the market. Swift’s proposal is to call attention to the horrid living conditions in Ireland to convince the English to stop exploiting the Irish. He accomplishes this by encouraging the audience to believe he’s creditable, using statistics and the advantages of his proposal to appear logical, appealing to the emotions of the reader. One way Swift is able to encourage the reader that the persona he creates is a creditable source he attempts to convince the reader that his persona is a worthy person of his country. He appeals to
Continue Reading
View Writing Issues

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    Analysis Of Jonathan Swift's A Modest Proposal
    • 76 Words
    • 1 Page

    Analysis Of Jonathan Swift's A Modest Proposal

    Jonathan Swift’s ‘A Modest Proposal’ talks about how children of poor people are a burden to their parents and how the parents should fatten up their children and then feed them to Ireland’s rich land-owners. But in the last sentence of ‘A Modest Proposal’, “I have no children, by which I can propose a single penny; the youngest being nine and my wife past child-bearing” is one example of the verbal irony in the whole pamphlet.…

    • 76 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis
    • 289 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis

    If Swifts ‘Modest Proposal’ is satire, as everyone seems to think, then I am even more repulsed in the writing than I was before. Everyone at the webinar the other day thought the little baby was such a cute, darling, little thing, and I agree, life is beautiful. To find humor in, or joke about, killing and eating babies is quite disgusting actually. Finding humour in something so disturbing, grotesque and violent, is quite assaulting to human dignity. The fact, that the author distanced himself from the piece by writing anonymously points to the fact he knew of its graphic assault, whether satire or not.…

    • 289 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Satisfactory Essays

    A Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis
    • 258 Words
    • 2 Pages

    A Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis

    Jonathan Swift establishes credibility through rewording few of his acquaintances: “…a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London… a grave author, an eminent French physician… a very worthy person, a true lover of his country, and whose virtues I highly esteem… the famous Psalmanazar, a native of the island Formosa.” However, because the information he gathers are from people that others would not know of, his credibility is questionable. Nevertheless, he also gives very detailed and specific facts that help support his argument. Basically, Swift appeals to his audience through rhetorical literary techniques—logos, ethos, and pathos. The entire proposal is a measurement of Swift’s ethos and logos. The way he presents…

    • 258 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Jonathan Swift Rhetorical Analysis
    • 185 Words
    • 1 Page

    Jonathan Swift Rhetorical Analysis

    The final technique that Swift employs to exacerbate tensions between the British and Irish as a result of Ireland’s struggling economy is a satirical ethos, impersonating an economist to suggest that without British cooperation, eating children is the only viable resolution to Ireland’s economy. Swift diction reflects this purpose as he employs economic jargon repeatedly throughout the essay, including as “commodity, yield, computed, per annum, and net profit” (Swift) . He contributes to the persona later in the essay, when he makes realistic calculations to “prove” that cannibalism will benefit the economy , such as “subtracting thirty thousand couples” to find that “there will remain an hundred and seventy thousand breeders” (Swift 6). After…

    • 185 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    A Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis
    • 588 Words
    • 3 Pages

    A Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis

    “A Modest Proposal” is a strongly written satire by Jonathon Swift. In the essay, Swift applies nearly all of the elements of satire. Some of the most obvious elements are his use of creating a persona and his exaggeration. Beginning by analyzing the title, “A Modest Proposal for Preventing the Children of Poor People in Ireland from Being a Burden to Their Parents or Country, and For Making Them Beneficial to The Public”, it is a reasonable topic for the essay. However it is not at all modest. Swift absurdly creates suggestions to make the poor children beneficial. His primary goal in this essay is to shame the English, bring up the issues of poverty and motivate the Irish.…

    • 588 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Contradictions In A Modest Proposal
    • 365 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Contradictions In A Modest Proposal

    In A Modest Proposal, Jonathan Swift presents a scheme to rid Ireland of the starving masses leaching off the state by starting a trade that promotes killing and eating the young poor poppers as livestock. Through this message paired with proper and detached diction, gruesome imagery and heavy amounts of satire, Swift illustrates the dehumanization of the masses by the elite. Additionally, he highlights the contradictions between seemingly civilized rules of society compared with the actual corruption at its core. Presenting the solution to the issue, Swift calls the masses potential “breeders”, which brings them down to the level of livestock (2634). Using this barbaric way of looking at another human being paired with the detached and proper…

    • 365 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    A Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis
    • 449 Words
    • 2 Pages

    A Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis

    In “A Modest Proposal”, Jonathan Swift reaches out to the readers about social problems that the great town and county are going through. I believe Swift is trying to tell the readers in a satirical way that the government and political party are not doing anything in the country to solve the social problems. Swift believed the only way to catch their attention was to write the essay “A Modest Proposal”. Swift used satire in his essay to inform people of Ireland how high poverty, hunger, and death rates were not getting any help from the government.…

    • 449 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    A Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis
    • 608 Words
    • 3 Pages

    A Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis

    In his satirical essay "A Modest Proposal," Johnathan Swift examines treatment of the poor in Ireland during the eighteenth century: “I have been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London; that a young healthy child, well nursed, is, at a year old, a most delicious, nourishing, and wholesome food; whether stewed, roasted, baked or boiled, and I make no doubt, that it will equally serve in a fricassee, or ragout.” (Swift 763) In his essay, Swift describes a repulsive suggestion for dealing with the children of the poor in Ireland. Swift describes in detail how poor children should be raised and sold to the wealthy at age one. He details how the children should be and how they should be prepared for the wealthy to consume. Swift's abhorrent proposal for the poor children not only points out the awful treatment of the poor in Ireland during the eighteenth century, but also Ireland's inability to devise a more desirable plan for the poor. His use of statistics and graphical depiction of the poor children's lives adds to the credibility of his essay.…

    • 608 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Better Essays

    A Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis
    • 1172 Words
    • 5 Pages

    A Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis

    Swift’s use of metaphors is graphic, gripping, and disturbing simultaneously. He shocks the readers by proposing that Irish babies should be used in recipes for stew as a delicacy that both the rich English and Irish can consume. He uses wit as a tool to depict the condition of the poor forcing the reader to revise the political climate faced by the Irish. To help them…

    • 1172 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
    Read More
  • Better Essays

    A Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis
    • 1309 Words
    • 6 Pages

    A Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis

    Although Ireland was an autonomous kingdom during the eighteenth century, the English Parliament still exerted its power from afar. The weak social relations made it so that England overlooked the economical instability in Ireland. The anger that lies behind A Modest Proposal holds both England and Ireland dually responsible for the turmoil. This is illustrated first by dehumanizing the Irish people. The proposer compares them to livestock, referring to the women as “breeders” (Swift 342), and proposes, “a young healthy child” will serve as “a most delicious, nourishing, and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled” (Swift 342). By doing this, Swift criticizes both the English government for merely viewing the people of Ireland as insignificant, and also attacks the Irish for allowing themselves…

    • 1309 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Satire In A Modest Proposal
    • 518 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Satire In A Modest Proposal

    In “A Modest Proposal”, the theme of the short story is all but modest. The proposal is that the people of Ireland should start eating babies in order to dilute the population and to provide money (to, for example, the renters) for the poor who cannot afford food. John Swift uses this ironic satire in order to catch the reader's attention. It is his way of saying ‘here is a ridiculous idea, now think of an actual solution’. The solution that Swift proposes is one that would work but is deemed immoral.…

    • 518 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    A Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis
    • 755 Words
    • 4 Pages

    A Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis

    Stereotypes against Irish Catholics make it easier for Swift to use them as the subject of his satire. The stereotypes are present in both the reasons for the proposal and the language used. The narrator’s argument that something must be done with infants because they are too young to steal implies that this is a common employment of Irish Catholics, even while it is humorous apart from the stereotype. The overall idea…

    • 755 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    A Modest Proposal Essay
    • 555 Words
    • 2 Pages

    A Modest Proposal Essay

    The late 1600s and early 1700s in particular were a difficult time for Ireland. Catholics made up most of the Irish poor who constituted 80 percent of the population and owned less than one-third of the land. As the Protestant English landowners took over in the 1700s, the Irish Catholics dove deeper into lives of famine and poverty. In “A Modest Proposal”, Jonathan Swift presents several claims and supporting evidence that the consuming of the Irish nation’s growing number of children will solve the poverty epidemic as well as decrease religious enemies.…

    • 555 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    A Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis
    • 697 Words
    • 3 Pages

    A Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis

    Johnathan Swift writes this satirical proposal to "prevent the children of poor people in Ireland from being a burden to their parents or the country" and to make them "beneficial to the public".…

    • 697 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Better Essays

    A Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis
    • 943 Words
    • 4 Pages

    A Modest Proposal Rhetorical Analysis

    (Swift, 1729) He goes so far as to suggest different ways of preparing the children as meals. (Swift, 1729) He claims that this is the only answer for all the children born into poverty. (Swift, 1729) He claims that under their present day conditions, it is impossible to solve the problem by any other means. (Swift, 1729) The poor cannot be employed in handicraft or agriculture, or build houses and cultivate land. (Swift, 1729) Children can’t make a living as thieves until around six years of age so that isn’t an option. Nope, all that can be done with them is to eat them. (Swift,…

    • 943 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Better Essays
    Read More

Related Topics