|
Post by Ms. English on May 30, 2023 8:27:41 GMT -5
Post your answers to the discussion question here. Make sure to read the responses of those posted before you and respond directly to them when appropriate before posting your own. Connections: Read Orwell's essay against a very different one -- Jonathan Swift's "A Modest Proposal" (link below). These pieces are deeply political, yet in very different ways, both in terms of the points they make and the ways in which they make them. How do these differences relate to each other? Do the strategies serve the message?www.readwritethink.org/files/resources/30827_modestproposal.pdf
|
|
|
Post by johnhawver on Jul 31, 2023 22:23:44 GMT -5
The differences in "A Modest Proposal" and "Shooting an Elephant" politically are regarding who they support. In "Shooting an Elephant", the point of view is from a European from the British Empire and his struggles with the Burmese. The Burmese had a hatred for Europeans, and Orwell has problems with them, but is also sympathetic towards their situation, with the British Empire expanding. In "A Modest Proposal", Jonathan Swift suggests an evil solution to poverty in Ireland that includes selling poor Irish children to wealthy English landlords as food. These differences relate to each other because Orwell is part of a powerful Empire that has control over the Burmese, but he is sympathetic toward them and believes imperialism is wrong. Swift's essay is not sympathetic toward the Irish at all and is very audacious, considering the Irish have been taken advantage of by the English. The strategies do serve the messages. Orwell's narrative has some sympathy and recognition of the Burmese situation throughout the text, and he shoots the elephant because of the Burmese people urging him on. Swift's essay is very straight forward and is not a narrative, its a proposal that is theoretically possible, but so very cruel.
|
|
brynn
New Member
Posts: 10
|
Post by brynn on Aug 7, 2023 10:56:18 GMT -5
In George Orwell's "Shooting an Elephant" he talks about how in British Imperialism the people ruling over the other country become what the people expect them to. He shows this by telling a story of how he was pressured into shooting an elephant to "avoid looking a fool". Jonathan Swift's "A Modest Proposal" is a proposal to reduce poverty and put more food into the market, the proposal being to sell and eat poor women's babies. The post above me is right, it's a cruel proposal, but it's also satire and supposed to represent how richer people in Ireland treated the poor and struggling people. Both essays talk about the effects of the rich people in Ireland or the British empire are having on a group of people that is being oppressed or treated badly by them. The strategies of both of them I think work very well. Orwell's honesty and his own experience with how Imperialism effected India show his point clearly and is convincing in his sincerity. Since Swift is trying to show the ridiculousness of how poor people were treated in Ireland his ridiculous proposal does that very well.
|
|
dadyl
New Member
Posts: 4
|
Post by dadyl on Sept 4, 2023 23:22:36 GMT -5
Johnathan Swifts A Modest Proposal and George Orwell's Shooting an Elephant are both similar and different in many ways. The main similarities between the two is both A Modest Proposal and Shooting an Elephant critiques colonial British rule. A Modest Proposal discuses starvation caused by British rule in Ireland and Shooting an elephant discusses strange cultural pleasures caused by colonial rule in British Raj (Modern day India Bangladesh Pakistan). I would say the most important difference between the tow is their style of critique. A Modest proposal Critiques Colonialism using satire to try to illustrate the cruelty of the situation in Ireland at the time. Shooting an Elephant Critiques colonialism by putting you in the perspective of one of the colonizers and showing his failure to want to assimilate to the new culture.
|
|