Practice Essay Two
It is indeed the nature of human beings to act according to their self-interest. This passage skilfully drafted by Rachel Carson shows the people of Indiana the harmful effects of the chemical pesticides they are using to control pests and birds in their farms. The paper provides a detailed explanation of the detrimental effects of chemical pesticides and the rhetorical strategies she employs to elaborate on her main argument in the passage.
The passage majors on poisonous pesticides in specific parathion, which most people use to control pesticides in their farms. Due to farmers’ own interest in improving their farm produce, the farmers of Indiana have adopted chemical pesticides to control pests and birds in their farms. ‘There is a growing trend towards aerial applications of deadly poisons like parathion to ‘control’ concentration of birds'(Carson 2). Parathion pesticide application has contributed to the killing of birds, threatening human life, and environmental sustainability. In the passageCarson’s main argument is to enlighten people of the danger that chemicals they use threaten humans, wildlife, domestic animals, and the greater environment.
Carson employs plenty of rhetorical strategies like diction, audience, tone, in the passage to convey meaning to the harmfulness of parathion chemical in humans, animals, and the environment. She begins her argument with diction in line one to five. She argues, ‘ As the habit of killing grows-the resort to ‘eradicating’ any creature that may annoy or inconvenience us –birds are more and more finding themselves as a direct target of poisons rather than an incidental one.’ (Carson 2). She uses the periodic sentence phrase to build a concrete syntax. She employs this sentence structure to build the issue of the harmfulness of the parathion chemical before stating it. Carson also uses rhetorical questions to inform the people of Indiana about the harmful effects of parathion pesticide on the environment and people. She provides a vital inquiry in lines 35-37. ‘If so who guarded the poisoned area to keep out any who might wonder in, in misguided search of for unspoiled nature?’ (Carson 2). Carson also uses tone as a rhetorical strategy to convey her central argument. The tones she uses in and anger and scientific tones. The scientific tone is seen in her well-planned elucidation of the harmful effects of parathion on the workers who handled the foliage treated with parathion and the piles of feathers of lifeless birds killed by the pesticide. These side effects of the chemical bring out her tone of anger, which she controlled throughout the passage. For example, she says, ‘In California orchards sprayed with this same parathion, workers handling foliage that had been treated a month earlier collapsed and went into shock.’ (Carson 2). In conclusion, Carson’s short passage informs farmers of the dangerous effects of chemicals like parathion on human life, wildlife, domestic animals, and the environment.