Analysis Of Eric Schlosser 's ' The Strawberry Fields '

Jonathan Yardley was a book critic for the Washington Post and a Pulitzer Prize winner for Criticism. In an occasional series from The Post, Yardley critics one of the most notable novels from the past: The Catcher in the Rye. His objective is to persuade his readers that The Catcher in the Rye is neither a well written book --as many claim it is-- nor a book that is deserving enough to be labeled an “American classic.” Yardley uses a sardonic, yet criticizing tone along with rhetorical devices such as antithesis, hypophora, understatements, and epithets to support his thesis and help the reader perceive the book from his position.

Over the past couple decades the number of undocumented immigrants involved in American agriculture has increased by the hundreds. They have dominated the fields on the west coast and have been put to work in some very harsh conditions. Many people in the US believe that these men, women, and even children are occupying jobs that legal citizens could have. We realize that even though much of our agriculture these days is harvested by modern technologies, a big part of the agriculture’s economy is made up of labor intensive from people, such as harvesting grapes, strawberries, pistachios, raspberries, etcetera. As we dig deeper into this topic we will realize why our agricultural

The “Struggle in the Fields” has always been a controversial issue. In the PBS series, we get to learn how many obstacles came along, when many Filipino farm workers along with Mexican American workers began to demand a change in the fields.

In Yusef Komunyakaa’s “Blackberries,” a youthful speaker seems to be living past the boundaries of city life and exhibits qualities of rural living. The poem tells of the speaker’s adventure of picking blackberries from a thicket and encountering the duality of urban society. Readers of “Blackberries” might at first be puzzled by the speaker’s youthful memory of picking berries, but a closer analysis of the poem allows readers to recognize that the speaker’s internal conflict originates from strict societal boundaries and the loss of his childhood innocence.

A horror story should have some elements to grab the attention of audience such as suspense and mystery. However, it is a challenge to achieve this goal especially in a short story, but that did not seem to be an obstacle for Stephen King, who is famous for writing horror fiction stories. Jeffrey W. Hunter, who is editor of Contemporary Literacy Criticism, believes that Stephen King is a marketing phenomenon for the large number of books he has sold. One of his first works was “Strawberry Spring,” which was published along with other short stories in a book titled Night Shift in 1978. In the same manner as other Stephen King’s writings, “Strawberry Spring” is a story loaded of mystery where death is one of the main components. The story begins with a narrator’s memory about what happened eight years ago when he was in college in 1968. The narrator remembers how a serial killer who was called Springheel Jack came into action during strawberry spring which is a natural phenomenon that only happens every eight years. Four young women were murdered in that year. Despite the efforts and investigations of police, the murderer was never caught. After eight years, the strawberry spring has come back and the killer, as well. Without a doubt, first person narrative point of view, setting, and symbolism are crucial elements that make “Strawberry Spring” a fascinating story.

Often times tragic events and circumstances are overlooked due to the withdrawn and unemotional telling of events. While statistics are important, they lack the emotional pull to generate change. In order to make a change, there must be a call for action to the public. A call for action can come in many ways. In regards to poverty in Harlem, New York, Muriel Rukeyser, a famous twentieth century poet from New York, called for action through her poetry. Rukeyser used imagery and symbolism in her poem, “Ballad of Orange and Grape,” to tell a story of poverty-stricken Harlem in order to advocate for education to combat poverty. Specifically, her vivid description of the setting and its glimpses of hope allows readers to empathize with the citizens of the city and crave change. In response to her poem, I felt moved to find a legitimate solution to mend a broken system. Research shows that revamping the public school system can create a domino effect, leading to higher quality of life and a way out of poverty for the people in the United States.

Throughout the era of the great depression, migrant farm workers were put at unfair labor. A man named Cesar Chavez helped migrant farm workers by boycotting the fruit companies they worked for and forming unions for them. The beginning of Chavez’s life, striking and boycotting fruit companies, and his new projects were the biggest impact in changing farm worker’s lives.

After reading The Sunflower, I’ll admit I had a lot of questions. When I started reading some of the response essays, I saw some of the same questions asked that I had. One that stuck out to me the most was the essay by Alan L. Berger. Berger’s reason for writing his essay was the issues being inflexible and his students questioning them. What was very evident to me about his essay was how he questioned why was Simon silent, If Karl was sincere, If Simon was the one to answer Karl’s response, and was Simon scarred by the interaction with Karl?

In Jeanne Laskas’ article, “Hecho en America”, which translates to “Made in America”, Laskas recalls when she spent a season with the blueberry pickers and argues how they are responsible for providing the fruits Americans consume. According to her article, “Most of the people who pick our food come from Mexico. They blanket the entire country, and yet to most of us they 're strangers, so removed from our lives we hardly know they 're here, people hunched over baskets in the flat distance as we drive down vacation highways. ” She is basically saying that the fruit pickers are taken for granted. Then, she states her argument that in the media and during election times, illegal immigration is a big problem and something must be done. They are taking American jobs, jobs that no one in America wants to do anyway. All of these things are used to distract America from the back-breaking, hard work these people do.

To begin, the title, "In the Strawberry Fields" is an allusion to The Beatles song "Strawberry Fields Forever", which once broken down, holds a variety of comparisons to the immigrants. Though none of the comparisons are directly written in the text by Schlosser, when further examining the lyrics, they begin to shine through. For example, the lyrics, "Life is easy with eyes closed, misunderstanding all you see" is highly similar to the immigrants and their life on the fields. Corrupted the industry stands as the blind workers are oblivious to the cheating and mistreatment right in front of them. Unfortunately, this is what the immigrants must endure in order to make a profit for their families. It is such an appalling place that the workers

Almost all farm workers are illegal immigrants and are day laborers, must chase crops to make a living. Farm workers are also constantly at the mercy of variable adversities like natural disasters and bad weather. On average illegal migrant workers spend half of the year working and quarter of the year looking for a job. In addition illegal immigrants are hard to find a place to stay because they are in not in legal status and are required proper documentation by law to rent an apartment. On the other hand Illegal immigrants keep move place to place to find a job and looking for shelter to stay. Most of the illegal immigrants live with fear in face all time because of lack of job security and insecure life. According to Schlosser’s article "In 1951 the President 's Commission on Migratory Labor condemned the abysmal living conditions of illegal immigrants employed as migrant farm workers in the United States. At the time, workers were found living in orchards and irrigation ditches. They

Holmes’ purpose in conducting his fieldwork with the migrant workers (specifically the Triqui of Mexico) of California and Washington fruit agriculture was to gain understanding from a perspective many do not consider and that has not been assessed in this way before. Similarly, the goal of this book was to pass that understanding to the common reader, the average American, those who are affected directly and those who are believe they are unaffected by the migrants of American agriculture—and to distinguish that they are not unaffected. Doing so creates the potential for change, even if by only a small factor like

On average, you will walk past a murderer ~12 times in your life. The question is, however, who are the killers and who are the innocents? It couldn’t be you, obviously. Since you know that you aren’t guilty, you feel reassured you are within the social norm. This feeling of normality is what makes us feel safe, and one of the reasons why Stephen King’s theory for why we crave horror is correct. King accurately claims that humans watch horror as a way face our fears, re-establish our sense of normality, and to have fun.

Way before Cesar Chavez even existed, the Southwestern United States, where there was a significant amount of agriculture work, was in desperate need of agricultural unions. The life of the average farm worker wasn’t a luxurious one. Working in crops often involved harsh working conditions which were filthy or dangerous and negligible pay.(Source N) With over 3 million farm workers in the United States, 72% were from a foreign

The United States is well known as the land of opportunity. Many immigrants come here to work and live a better life. For immigrants that cannot enter the country legally, the end result is to enter the country illegally. The majority of undocumented immigrants “do often take some of the country’s least attractive job, such as agriculture” (Davidson).