The Jungle In the early 1900's life in Chicago was met with an overwhelming amount struggles for the working class. Families were forced to send their children to work in factories, jobs paid barley paid enough to scrape by, and jobs were often extremely unsafe. In his book, The Jungle, Upton Sinclair makes it clear that working life in America is miserable, and changes need to be made. For Sinclair this change is socialism, a form of government that focuses on economic equality for all. Sinclair
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157 men divided into 78 different ‘trades,’ each man performing the same minute operation a thousand times during a full workday.” The book portrays the objects poverty, harsh working condition and often dangerous unsanitary living condition. The jungle showed the public what was going on the factories. It showed how owners had no regard for worker safety nor public safety. People getting fingers cut off and being mixed in with meat bad/ diseased food so on. It impacted the world by showing how immigrants
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In Upton Sinclair’s novel, “The Jungle”, the life of a man named Jurgis and his family is documented as they immigrate to America in the very early 20th century. What the book is intended to do is shed light on the issues of America in its early stages dealing with capitalism and socialism. It shows the struggles that Jurgis goes through just to attempt to make ends meet for his family and live an average life. While his goals and aspirations take a turn very shortly after his arrival, this is a
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When first reading The Jungle by Upton Sinclair, I couldn’t help but think of the term “social Darwinism”. This is a term that we learned in history last year and ultimately connects the biological concept of “survival of the fittest” to human interaction in society. This impression is seen many times throughout Sinclair’s work, but was most accurately depicted in the passages where Jurgis gets involved in politics and becomes friends with upper-class men such as Jack Duane. It can be seen that
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Cornelius Vanderbilt was born on May 27, 1794 in the port Richmond area of Staten Island, New York. As a child Cornelius grew up poor, as he watched his illiterate father, Cornelius Vanderbilt Sr., exhaust himself working as a seaman. Vanderbilt attended school till the age of 11 when the tragic death of one of his eight brothers occurred. As a young boy Vanderbilt grew up working with his father in the ferry by the New York Harbor. In 1810 when he was sixteen years old he convinced his parents to
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Upton Sinclair’s novel, The Jungle, does not take place in an actual jungle. It actually takes place in the early 1900s in Packingtown, Chicago at a meat-packing industry, with the purpose to inform the literate citizens of that time of the gruesome working conditions and contamination of the meat industry. Although it takes place in that location, Sinclair shows the jungle-like atmosphere through literature with different word choice and allegories. For example, during the wedding in the first chapter
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the 20th Century America, was not a happy place to reside in. Though many immigrants were hopeful with leaving everything behind for their new homes in America, they had no clue what awaited them when they arrived. Jurgis Rudkus, a character in The Jungle by Upton Sinclair, was one of those hopeful immigrants that left everything behind. Jurgis and his family left their homeland of Lithuania seeking the opportunities that the American Dream could possibly provide for them. When they arrived they learned
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the nineteenth century created many new industries, improved the economy, and made the United States a top destination for immigrants. Consequently, industrialization led to the exploitation of the working class and the rise of the socialism1. The Jungle by Upton Sinclair illustrated the fate of immigrants in Chicago in the meatpacking industry, the harsh realities of life in the city, and the truth about opportunity in America as a result of capitalism. Through vivid imagery, metaphors, and symbolism
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The quote “Good literature substitutes for an experience which we have not ourselves lived through." means that works of literature can substitute for an experience in which we the reader have not endured ourselves. His most notable work was The Jungle in which he exposed the American public to the inhumane and hazardous conditions of the meat packing industry and the injustices faced by immigrants. Upton Sinclair was born on September 20, 1878 in Baltimore, Maryland to an alcoholic father whom
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Progressivism was a time period where there was emphasis on improving working conditions, improving the way of life, exposing corruption, and expanding democracy. The excerpts from Fast Food Nation and The Jungle outline the citizens who demanded a change in numerous areas such as business, labor, economy, consumers, and an increase of democracy. The Jungle’s main goal is to allure and impel the audience to endorse socialism. Throughout the excerpt Sinclair makes efforts to discredit the capitalist
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