Wednesday, October 5, 2011

Rebecca Harding Davis

Vince Tang
English 48A
Journal for R. H. Davis
October 6, 2011

Reading Quote:

“If I had the making of men, these men who do the lowest part of the world’s work should be machines,-nothing more,-hands” (2610).

Research Quote:

“The historical importance of ‘Life in the Iron-Mills’ is partly as a record of the underside of American industrial prosperity, but what finally matters is that the story is an overwhelming reading experience that refuses to provide easy answers to the social problems it so powerfully delineates” (2599).

Summary of Reading Quote:

Davis’s quote is saying that the only worth to the men of the lowly work is their labor.

Response:

The reading quote is a dialogue from the character Kirby, one of the mill owners. The quote is the most inhumane words ever crafted. It directly exemplifies the greed in capitalism. How can someone step into the inferno of an iron mill and feel no sympathy for the workers? Moreover, speak of them as though they do not breathe the flames fume, feel the fires heat, hear the grueling grinds, taste the ashes on their tongues; refer to them as senseless human beings. It is obvious that the social class of the mill workers is much lower than Kirby. Nonetheless, they are people with physical senses and emotions capable of interacting and making decisions in the world. The only difference between the mill owner Kirby and the mill workers is the output of their function in life. Aside from that, they all have the same natural human characteristics.

In Lies My Teacher Told Me, James W. Loewen mentions “…that opportunity is not equal in America…” (205). This creates a significant impact on the social classes. Loewen’s statement is especially true in the era that Life in the Iron-Mills is based on. The characters cannot simply pack up their cars and move to a more promising community, or they cannot search for jobs on the internet as we do with our modern technology. The characters in Davis’s story, as well as the people in the reality of the American industrial revolution, are often born, raised, work, and simply live within their social class. This is agreed by Loewen when he says that “…most Americans die in the same social class in which they were born…” (210).

The descriptive power of Davis’s language touches her readers through their sympathy and compassion for the characters in the story. Davis’s realistic portrayal of the upper and lower classes of Americans during the industrial revolution delivers a perspective of the lower class. It is no wonder that the 1861 publishing of Life in the Iron-Mills was so well recognized.


 

2 comments:

  1. 20/20 It's interesting that this journal is much, much clearer than the test you turned in the same week. Worth thinking about "why" -- so you can get stronger test grades (and so you can keep writing excellent journal posts!).

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  2. Oops used the wrong grading scale. I've adjusted all your week 1 thru weeks 2 journal scores to the "correct" 30 point scale in my gradebook. Sorry for the confusion!

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