English IV-H18 February 2009 Murphy
“A Modest Proposal”
Due Date: Thursday, February 26th
Assignment: Now that we have finished reading a satirical work, your assignment will be to write your own satire. Afterwards, you will write an explanation/description how you chose to formulate your satire. This assignment will be counted as a paper grade.
Topics: You may pick any topic to satirize. Remember that a key part of satire is the author’s intention to correct behavior in society through the use of mockery. Therefore, your satire should have a distinct purpose/goal (What changes do you want society to make?). Part of having a goal in mind is to determine your target audience (people reading the essay) and to choose the persons/place/thing you’re satirizing (what is being mocked in the essay). Your target audience and the target of your satire should beconnected in some way that will accomplish your goal [i.e. A satire of the organizations responsible for deforestation should NOT have a group of active environmentalists as its target audience, because doing so would not actually change anyone’s behavior—active environmentalist are already trying to stop deforestation].
Evaluation:
Criteria for Satire- Possesses a discernable purpose or goal; I should be able to tell what persons/place/thing you are criticizing (Remember, without a clear goal, it is not a satire!)
- Includes at least two different types of satirical techniques--correctly used. The types are: Exaggeration, Understatement, Incongruity, Parody, Reversal [listed on handout]
- Includes at least one rhetorical device
- Shows original ideas, creativity, and thoughtfulness
- State the intended audience and the persons/place/thing that was the target of the satire.
- State the purpose/goal of your satire.
- Explains how you used at least two types of satirical techniques
- Explain how you used at least one rhetorical device
- Do all of the above in a lucid and coherent manner.
Formatting: The satire will be (2-3) pages in length; typed, double-spaced, 1” margins, and all that jazz (unless changing the format is imperative to effectively communicate your satire). Explanations should be atleast 1½ pages in length; typed, double-spaced, 1” margins. Proofread for clarity and grammatical errors
To get an A or B on this assignment, you need the combination of several factors: 1) a correct application of satirical and rhetorical devices, 2) few or no grammatical errors, and 3) originality.
A Modest Proposal for Solving Transportation Issues and in doing so, Solving Public Heath Issues, and Benefiting the Economy of the Illustrious United States
Laura Paul
Transportation is the key to everything. While the United States is clearly the world leader in all matters, I, having thought about this issue, have come upon several solutions to our own transportation issues. All but one I have cast off as unsuitable for so advanced a nation as ours.
My solution would not only solve transportation issues, but many more, including those of public health, class inequities, and could only strengthen our economy.
Our great nation has about 10,000,000 households. If each adult of driving age was provided with his or her own car, transportation and many other issues would be solved.
The best mode of personal transportation is clearly a Hummer H3, an All-American, General Motors car, each costing around $30,000. In order for the government to provide one of each of these to our 10,000,000 households, some budget would clearly have to be sacrificed in order to pay the $300,000,000,000. But in the end, the gains would be so enormous that any initial costs are insignificant.
If, for example, we take the annual military budget, $60,000,000,000,000, and divide that by 365 days of the year, we get the daily military budget of $150,000,000,000.
I propose that, instead of any mediocre solutions such as “public transportation,” the United States withholds military spending for a mere four days. With that $600,000,000,000, each household would receive two Hummers.
Already this bodes well for the economy. With the production of 20,000,000 Hummers, not only would the steel and tire industries flourish, but thousands of the poor would be given yet another opportunity to raise themselves to a more respectable level by working to produce the Hummer H3s. Because General Motors is an All-American company, the enemies of this nation, who support terrorists, would not receive any of our profits. This, therefore, indirectly supports our God-sanctioned War against Terror.
As soon as the households receive their H3s, many other social issues will begin to solve themselves. For example, those who live in areas with poorer schools can just drive themselves to better ones. This avoids any issues with busing. Also, much of the population of the United States does not have access to healthful foods such as fresh vegetables. This is because their local stores, such as 7-Eleven, are not stocked well enough. Now that each household has transportation, they can drive farther in order to shop at stores such as Whole Foods. This will not only make the population altogether healthier, but it will encourage local stores to stock appropriately and eventually drive down prices.
Another critical problem in the American public is lack of exercise. With Hummers, people will spend more calories climbing up and down to get in and out than in they did not have a Hummer. Not to mention that with larger cars, the parking lots will be larger; this leads to a greater walking distance between shopping malls and parking places. But I digress.
Two H3s to every household in the United States is all that it would take. It would not only alleviate the poor, solve transportation issues, and in that dissolve inequities between classes, but also help the economy and support the War against Terror. A measly four days of peace (an overrated concept, I assure you) would completely remove the need for any attempts at inadequate public transportation, something we have watched our European neighbors fail at time and time again.
I am not so attached to this solution as to believe that the implementation of government-provided public transportation and education on other options such as carpooling, walking, or riding a bike, could not go a long way to solve our problems. However, who wouldn’t want a gas-guzzling H3?—like nothing else.