...My Modest Proposal It has come to my attention that the marking period is coming to an end. I am sure we all know what that means; it is time to finalize and lock those grade in for report cards. However, many kids tremble during this short period of time because they have grades that are not up to par. The biggest reason being is simple: zeros. Yes, you heard me, zeros. Plenty of students that are struggling with their grades are intelligent and hard working. They get high grades on tests, class work, homework, etc., but those dang zeros significantly hurt their overall grade. I know I have had my fair share of zeros in the past and I do not see this stopping for me anytime soon in the future. So I make this proposal, a modest proposal. Just exterminate grades completely. It is a win-win situation if you look at it: students will not have to dread and tear themselves apart because of poor scores; parents will not be angry at their children for low merits; teachers will have less paperwork to do and can concentrate more on great lesson planning; and finally it will save more trees from being turned into paper, because we have all seen stacks of paper utterly disregarded into trash bins to be disposed of inhumanely. Children these days also have jobs. How do you expect a child to make money and start saving for their life goals when they have piles of homework to do. So while trying to get homework done and make money, they are slacking on both ends....
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...Assignment #1: Surprise Ending in The Modest Proposal A Modest Proposal by Jonathan Swift is a satirical story with lots of sarcasm. This proposal was written to shock or force the government into a reaction. As the government read his proposal it should bring about a response. This proposal suggests a “barbaric solution” that amounts purely to cannibalism. Mr. Swift’s idea is to help end poverty and decrease the amount of women beggars by eating babies of the poor. He devised a plan where he would take 20,000 babies and decide how many would be sold, how many would be breeders thus creating a balance between rich and poor. Mr. Swift’s plan would give the poor a means of income and the wealthy would get a fine and delicate meal. He stated that feeding on Irish babies was a treat and the English should be honored to feast on the babies. Swift based his proposal on facts and figures of many years of analyzing the situation. He does seem well educated and well versed on his proposal. He noted several benefits and advantages to his proposal. Some of those benefits included women being more loving towards their children. Another benefit would be more marriages happening with men catering to their wives while they were pregnant. Swift also quoted a friend that was a modern day swindler. The friend was supposedly from Formosa and told a story where 18,000 young boys were sacrificed to the Gods’ and Priests’. The Gods’ dined on the hearts and the Priests’ dine on...
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...Jonathan Swift. A Modest Proposal Return to Renascence Editions Jonathan Swift A Modest Proposal. (1729) Note on the e-text: this Renascence Editions text was converted to HTML from the University of Adelaide mirror of the ERIS Project plain text edition. The text is in the public domain. Content unique to this presentation is copyright © 1999 The University of Oregon. For nonprofit and educational uses only. Send comments and corrections to the Publisher at rbear[at]uoregon.edu. [Note: the five most pertinent paragraphs were missing from this text when we received it, and it has been corrected (in red below) as of 3/9/05. Our apologies. Risa Bear] 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 melancholy object to those who walk through this great town or travel in the country, when they see the streets, the roads, and cabin doors, crowded with beggars of the female sex, followed by three, four, or six children, all in rags and importuning every passenger for an alms. These mothers, instead of being able to work for their honest livelihood, are forced to employ all their time in strolling to beg sustenance for their helpless infants: who as they grow up either turn thieves for want of work, or leave their dear native country to fight for the Pretender in Spain, or sell themselves to the Barbadoes. I think it is agreed by all parties that...
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...A Modest Proposal is a satirical pamphlet that explores the attitude that the rich have towards the poor and starving children that dwell in their society. The author Johnathan Swift effectively uses rhetorical devices such as ethos, pathos, and logos, as well as humor and sarcasm to shed light and highlight these attitudes. Johnathan starts off by blaming the mothers of these starving and poor children that they should find themselves work so that they can earn an honest living instead of begging and groveling on the streets in hopes to be able to feed their young ones and themselves. He also says that the children will then become thieves just to make ends meet when they are older and this is simply because their parents did not teach their children how to live a modest and honest life. Swift uses logical fallacies to make his argument in "A Modest Proposal". This is evident when he explains how a well nursed child at...
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...A Modest Proposal Essay Sheila Wolfe HUM112041VA016-1152-001: World Cultures II Dr. Sue Lafferty 01/31/2015 I chose to do my essay on Jonathon Swift’s “A Modest Proposal”. Swift’s Essay is a style called satire (the use of irony, sarcasm, ridicule, or the like, in exposing, denouncing, or deriding vice, folly, etc. – Dictionary.com). When you first start to read the essay Swift describes the horrible conditions of the poor and the burden on the parents to try and feed their children. As you read on Swift starts to talk about the poor innocent babes being murdered by their mothers or the voluntary abortions running rapid in the Kingdom – “……Women murdering their bastard children, alas! too frequent among us, sacrificing the poor innocent babes, I doubt, more to avoid the expense than the shame, which would move tears and pity in the most savage and inhuman breast.” After swift goes through a lengthy description of the deplorable state that the poor are in and running the numbers of children by the poor he then purpose his thoughts on how to deal with the children. His plan for helping the poor sell and eat their children. WHAT?? Swift wrote “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 a ragoust.” When I first read those...
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...Jonathan Swift's satirical essay "A Modest Proposal" was published anonymously in 1729. The author draws a reader's attention to problems related to poverty in Dublin, Ireland. Swift recommends his own solution and explains how the problems can be solved. In an outrageous way, he proposes that Irish infants can be sold, eaten, and used for other purposes as well; "instead of being a charge upon their parents or the parish, or wanting food and raiment for the rest of their lives, they shall on the contrary contribute to the feeding, and partly to the clothing, of many thousands" (832). Swift goes further and suggests, "Those who are more thrifty (as I must confess the times require) may flea the carcass; the skin of which artificially dressed will make admirable gloves for ladies, and summer boots for fine gentlemen" (834). The author's essay is full of examples, numbers, and descriptions which undoubtedly shock a reader. After describing all the details related to his proposal, Swift lists the advantages of his proposed solution. He ensures that his offer will have a positive impact on the economy, society, and marriages. This essay is a proposal because the author suggests a concrete solution. We can consider it modest when we read the last sentences of his work, "I profess, in the sincerity of my heart, I have not the least personal interest in endeavoring to promote this necessary work, having no other motive then the public good of my country, by advancing our trade, providing...
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..... .. | | . |A Modest Proposal | |By Jonathan Swift (1667-1745) | |A Study Guide | |Cummings Guides Home..|..Contact This Site | |.. | |Type of Work | |Purpose | |Historical Background | |Summary | | ...
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...Ryan Warm 1 Swift wrote "A Modest Proposal" under a pseudonym, so who is the speaker here? The speaker was created by Swift, and in this case was a man off of the street. 2 Discuss the tone of the piece. Pull examples from the text to support your discussion. The tone was informative and optimistic, because the man told of his solution and believed that it would work. For example, when he says, “There is likewise another great advantage in my scheme, that it will prevent those voluntary abortions, and that horrid practice of women murdering their bastard children, alas!” 3 As you know, effective argumentation appeals to logic (logos), ethics (ethos) and emotions (pathos). Please discuss how Swift uses all three appeals and how these tools impact his purpose. Swift appealed to logic by proposing something illogical, which provokes attention. He appealed to ethics by creating something unethical, which is eating children. He appealed to emotions by making certain people angry with his crazy proposal. All of these appeals cause readers to take interest in his essay and helped them realize the issues in society. 4 Explain the irony in Swift’s title, "A Modest Proposal." This proposal was very extreme, by suggesting the eating of children to solve the problem; so calling it modest is very ironic. 5 Where does this essay fit on the continuum (Horatian to Juvenalian)? Explain/support your position. The essay is Juvenalian...
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...In “A Modest Proposal” Jonathan Swift appeals to his readers with sarcasm, and outlandish ideas concerning the problem of hunger that Ireland was facing. Swift appeals to his readers with many rhetorical devices throughout the entire short story. The tone in this essay is both, academic and intelligent. The readers get the sense that the solution to the problems that the inhabitants of Ireland are facing will be logical, well-informed, and completely reasonable. However what the reader gets instead is an maniacal amount of information on the benefits of eating children. All while suggesting that doing so will provide a substantial food supply as well as economic relief (because there will be fewer mouths to feed). Since it is comprehensible that the essay is becoming more ironic, it is the last thing that any reasonable person would have thought. One of the quotes in the essay that help illustrate the irony in this essay is, “I...
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...Splenetic Ogres and Heroic Cannibals in Jonathan Swift’s A Modest Proposal (1729) Ahsan Chowdhury University of Alberta I. Cannibalism: Ethnic Defamation or a Trope of Liberation? In A Modest Proposal for Preventing the Children of Poor People from Being a Burthen to eir Parents and Country, and for Making em Beneficial to the Public () Swift exploits the age-old discourse of ethnic defamation against the Irish that had legitimated the English colonization of Ireland for centuries. One of the most damning elements in Swift’s use of this discourse is that of cannibalism. e discourse of ethnic defamation arose out of the Norman conquest of Ireland in the twelfth century. Clare Carroll points out that “the colonization of the Americas and the reformation as events … generated new discourses inflecting the inherited discourse of barbarism” in early-modern English writing about Ireland (). Narratives of native cannibalism were an indispensable part of these new discourses and practices. For the English authors as well as their continental counterparts, the cannibalistic other of the New World became a yardstick by which to measure the threat posed by internal enemies, be it the indigenous Irish, the French Catholics, or the Moorish inhabitants of Spain.¹ us, it was against the backdrop of the reforma Carroll demonstrates that while continental authors like Bartolomé de Las Casas and Jean de Léry could treat the Amerindians and their cannibalistic practices ...
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...Very “Modest” Irony and Satire Jonathan Swift was born in Ireland in the 18th century during an era that has come to be known as the Golden Age of Satire. As a writer, he was profoundly influenced by the political climate of his times, especially the plight of the Irish poor, which spurred him to write the satirical, social commentary “A Modest Proposal.” The satirical essay addresses the issue of inequality and poverty experienced by the Irish through an outlandish solution that is “beneficial” to everyone. Verbal is present throughout the essay and even in the title. The proposal is far from modest and is rather shocking which Swift does to grab the attention of the reader. He satirically recommends commoditizing Irish babies to improve the economic outlook by selling poor Irish babies to the rich as a delicious food item. Swift’s proposal in his essay is a technique used to highlight a real issue and bring awareness to it by ridiculing the public (reader) through satire. The definition of satire is the use of humor, irony, exaggeration, and ridicule to expose and criticize people’s vices. In “A Modest Proposal,” Swift does exactly that through clever social commentary on the issue of poverty among the poor in Ireland through the various forms of satire. Swift differentiates the social classes in his writing through imagery, detailing the differences between the rich and the poor. He states, “Prodigious number of children in the arms, or on the backs, or at the heels of their...
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...Jonathan Swifts “A Modest Proposal” is outrageously filled with sarcasm. One could assume what to expect from the piece just by reading the title “A Modest Proposal for preventing the children of poor people in Ireland from being a burden on their parents or country, and for making them beneficial to society” (Pg 1114). The average reader might would read this piece and think that Swift had literally gone insane. Swift proposes the thought that the mothers whom cannot provide for their children shall breast feed for the first year and once the child is “plump” be offered for sale(pg 1115) Swift even proposes the thought of eating a child… “a young healthy child well nursed is at a year old is a most deliciously, nourishing and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked or broiled ” (pg 1115) is just ridiculous. Swift also says that he “humbly” offers his thoughts and opinions, yet anyone would consider this suggestion offensive and irrational, not humble by any means. I believe Swift wrote such a piece in order to show how the wealthier Britons viewed the less fortunate lower class. They may have not thought anything of the actions they were showing toward the poor until reading such an article like Swifts and it opened their eyes to see how badly they were treating the people. I believe that Swift most definitely accomplished his point in writing such an article and that the privileged people offered more opportunity to the unsuccessful people of their community. (Word Count:253)...
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...Student Name Professor English Composition II 27 March 2015 A Modest Proposal: Part Two A “Modest Proposal” is a short story written by Jonathan Swift. To the best of my understanding it is supposed to show a solution to a problem of a social issue. In this story the apparent problem was the overabundance of children whom their mothers could not care for and they were roaming the streets begging or stealing. The setting as in Ireland and until the proposal came up, I thought this was a real life situation. After reading the story, I realize (or at least I hope) it cannot be. The author used irony in multiple situations throughout the story and along with ridiculous justifications the reader or audience is expected to accept. I found this story to be very distasteful and had it not been recommended reading, I would have chosen not to read it. The story falls under argumentive style. The proposal is arguing for hat he feels is right and beneficial to the town. Regardless of my personal opinion of the story, irony in a story is sometimes beneficial and effective. One of the most effective pieces of irony in this story was the proposer’s justification of using the children as food. He states “it will prevent those voluntary abortions, and that horrid practice of women murdering their bastard children (Swift, 306). He acted as if he was concerned about all the deaths of the children. When the...
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...Surprise Ending for A Modest Proposal John J Bradley IV Professor Nancy Pettigrew Humanities 112: World Cultures II November 5th, 2012 A Modest Proposal by Jonathan shift is a literary work of the 18th century that takes a symbolic aim at the greed of England’s renting policies and a plan to reduce the burdens, in this case children, caused by it. According to Sayre (2011) Swift composes with his tongue lodged in his cheek, quite possible, as never before. You can detect this in his work from the outrageous suggestions intended to lift the burden of children in poverty-stricken Ireland and alternatively to reap benefits from them. It is earlier stated that the proposal would be geared toward Irish families that could not afford to provide for their children, thus the slaughter of their children to cater the English would be the possible solution. The ‘Surprise Ending” in this proposal would be the revelation of Swift’s true proposition, the consideration of the poor and rebuttal of policy makers with realistic ideals to correct this ever so abundant problem. According to Lynch (n.d.) Swift preferred living in England, although he was Irish, which causes him to begrudge the policies toward his own people. With that being said, it becomes clear that the proposal will indeed have a surprise ending when swift speaks of his American acquaintance discoursing the subject, offering refinement. Although prior Knowledge obtained from Native Salmanaazor of Formosa Island offered...
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...One of the things that made me choose this piece of literature was the although the pamphlet is more than 280 years old, A Modest Proposal, is still considered one of the finest examples of satire literature. It is not an easy feat to be a renowned satirical writer. To be a great satirical writer, the author must be able to bring out the absurdity in any subject. Satire is considered a powerful and intellectual instrument that can be used to educate and inspire. There are just a few exceptional individuals who know very well how to use it. Additionally, the author must be able to use hyperbole to make their point. Using hyperbole is a rare literary form that exaggerates facts. Many people relate hyperbole to sarcasm. ”I have been assured by...
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