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 Jungle and Fast Food Nation are both books that were written to expose the working environments and carelessness that goes into preparing packaged meat. These two books were written to do two things. One of the two things that they were intended for was to outrage the public about how the food was being prepared, and what it took to prepare the food. The second goal was to have reforms done about these processes. Upton Sinclair wrote the Jungle in 1906 wanting the public and government to notice
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In 1906, Upton Sinclair published his best-selling muckraking novel The Jungle which exposed the horror stories that occurred in the meatpacking industry. Majority of people in 2017 would agree that his book is only a piece of history in our improved modern world, but what many people are unaware of is that horrifying working conditions within factory farms still exist today. Workers in the meat industry consist mainly of vulnerable people who are exposed to an outrageous amount of physical danger
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Paragraph 1: His background. Upton Sinclair was born in Baltimore, Maryland in September of 1878. He died in November of 1968 at the age of 90 in New Jersey. He was married three different times over his long life. According to his Wikipedia page his family did not have much money however his grandparents was quite wealthy, this gave him the advantage of seeing how wealthy and poor people lived. Seeing the 19th century from that point of view definitely had an impact on his writings. He loved reading
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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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