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A Rhetorical Analysis Of The Working Poor Ehrenreich

729 Words3 Pages

The working poor are a class of people that have their own culture that can only be understood through full participation in it; without proper acquaintance with their lifestyle, the working poor cannot be adequately examined or criticized. The author is skilled and effective in delivering her opinion of the working poor in the United States at the time; she includes numerous details and examples as support. The first paragraph of the piece is a long description of the restaurant, Jerry’s, and its conditions. This passage serves as one of the many visuals that she includes to evoke thought from the reader. Ehrenreich uses the passage to support her claims and opinions of the restaurant and the working poor as a whole. By including this …show more content…

Most of the passages in the excerpt include her own experiences as well as the experiences of others she meets. Her experiences with George the Czech dishwasher and the other waitresses reveal problems that Ehrenreich and her coworkers share. These communal issues are proof that Ehrenreich is confronting what the working poor encounter daily; she can understand on some level how this class of people live. She, or anyone else, can not fully comprehend the lives of the working poor, however she is surprisingly able to understand some of their physical and mental struggles. When Ehrenreich describes the scene in which George is fired, she is emotionally impacted and can recognize feelings that she is surprised she has. Her immersion into the lives of the lower class, although temporary, changes and affects Ehrenreich. She comments on this change and feeling by explaining “...in a month or two I might have turned into a different person altogether—say, the kind of person who would have turned George in”. This change in personality and adaptation to the conditions she lives in shows that her method of immersion research offers her a full experience that can be used for the piece. She is able to discover, by working for only a few months at Jerry’s, a phenomenon that plagues the working poor, and proves her research …show more content…

After reading the excerpt, it is clear that Ehrenreich has an emotional attachment in some way to the people she meets because of their camaraderie. The level of description and minute details may suggest sympathy, but are only used to get her point across. The use of extreme detail makes the excerpt seem like an exaggeration, but it is necessary for the reader to understand and connect with the piece on a more emotional level. The predominant tone is convincing and is used very respectfully. At no point does Ehrenreich suggest that the working poor are below anyone; she only reports what she and other workers experience. People like Vic, the assistant manager at Jerry’s, who holds low opinions and negative attitudes toward the working poor are skillfully included in the piece. They do not carry the same judgement of the working poor, and they act, essentially, as a foil for Ehrenreich to highlight the positive characteristics of other workers that often go unnoticed. The presentation of the research is skillful and effective with a convincing tone

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