Elements of the Argument: "What is Poverty?"
What do you consider poverty to be? Do you have a definitive explanation of it or do
you consider it an abstract circumstance? In the article "What is Poverty?", Jo Goodwin
Parker gives her ideas on what poverty is. First given as a speech, this article is
written as an attack on human emotion. Her use of connotative language creates many
harsh images of her experiences in a life of poverty. By using these images, Parker is
capable of causing the reader to feel many emotions and forces the reader to question his
or her own stereotypes of the poor. With the use of connotative language and the ability
to arouse emotion, Parker successfully compels the reader to examine his or her thoughts
and beliefs on who the poor are.
Parker's use of connotative language causes the reader to feel many emotions. Of these
emotions, a prominent one is guilt. Parker is capable of making the reader feel guilty
for the possessions that he or she has. For example, she uses the phrase "You say in
your clean clothes coming from your clean house, ..."(Parker 237). This causes the
reader to feel guilty for having the opportunity to be clean when we all know that she
doesn't have the same. She calls hot water a "luxury"(Parker 237). To those living in
poverty hot water is a luxury. The unimpoverished take it for granted and never before
considered it anything other than a basic possession. When the reader hears that someone
else calls it a luxury that they cannot afford, he or she can't help but feel guilty for
having it as a basic possession. Parker also attacks the guilt of the reader through
stories of her children. She knows that some readers may not feel guilty for things that
happen to her, but when children are introduced to the situation they will feel more
guilt. She says, "My children have no extra books, no magazines, no extra pencils, or
crayons, or paper..."(Parker 238). The reader cannot help but feel guilty for having
these basic things when her children, who need them, do not. Another thing that Parker
makes the audience feel guilty for having is health. She says, talking about her
children, "...most important of all, they do not have health."(Parker 238). She goes on
further to describe what is wrong with them. Parker says, "They have worms, they have
infections, they have pink-eye all summer"(238). These descriptions of her children
cause the reader to feel horrible for them. By making the reader feel this way she is
increasing the level of guilt the reader also feels. She is very successful in
accomplishing this and this success causes her argument to become very powerful.
Not only does she make us feel guilty for having possessions that she cannot, but
Parker also makes us feel guilty about the stereotypes we hold. She knows what society's
stereotypes are and she successfully combats them. Parker knows that society thinks the
poor don't want to work. To attack this she tells of why she can't work. She has three
children. The last time she had a job the babysitter she left them with did not take
care of them. She returned to find all three in dangerous situations. Her baby had not
been changed since she had left it there, her other was playing with a piece of sharp
glass, and her oldest was playing alone at the edge of a lake (Parker 236-237). Her
chances of finding a better babysitter are slim because she cannot afford a nursery
school due to fact that she makes too little (Parker 237). This is why she cannot work.
Her inability to work leads to many of the other stereotypes that society has of the
poor. Society questions why the poor cannot be clean. She tells of how without money
she cannot afford any cleaning supplies (Parker 237). Parker tells of how she saved for
two months to buy a jar of Vaseline and when she had finally saved enough the price had
gone up two cents (237). She cannot wash in soap because it has to be saved to clean the
baby's diapers (Parker 237). She effectively shows how society's stereotypes are
incorrect. She is capable of making the reader feel guilty for the stereotypes and
causes the reader to question why he or she has them. If the audience would just take a
little time to try and understand her situation they would know how unfounded the
stereotypes are.
Parker is also successful in evoking sympathy from the reader. She uses connotative
language to create disturbing images of what poverty is. For example, she calls poverty
an "acid that drips on pride until pride is worn away (Parker 239)." Not only is poverty
bad but it is an acid. An acid is a horrible thing. It burns and corrodes away at
something until it no longer exists. By this reasoning poverty is destroying her life.
This phrase forces the reader to consider poverty as something worse than they had ever
thought before. She shows poverty as a curse, as a "chisel that chips on honor until
honor is worn away (Parker 239)." Parker starts almost every paragraph with a new
definition of what poverty is. Some examples are:"poverty is being tired" (Parker 236),
"poverty is dirt" (237), "poverty is asking for help" (237), and "poverty is looking into
a black future" (238). All of these phrases create a different image of poverty and each
one is a success in evoking sympathy from the reader. They all force the reader to
imagine poverty in a new way. We all knew it was bad but Parker makes us realize how
bleak poverty is. She shows us that there is no hope for the poor without understanding.
Parker is successful in getting her point across with her use of connotative language
and her ability to create images. She has done a good job of attacking the reader and
getting him or her to listen to what she has to say. Even though she attacks the
audience she does it in an appropriate way whereas she does not come across as offensive.
All in all, Parker has done a successful job at creating images and using the readers'
emotion to get an audience to listen to her plight and the struggles of other's in her
situation.
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