The Great Influenza

The 1918 flu chaos shock the nation and left it frantic to fight off this sickness. Scientists drove themselves mad attempting to find a cure. In this passage, John M. Barry helps us better understand how this could take place using rhetorical strategies. He uses this mechanism to characterize scientific research by pulling from ideas that are really on the tip of our tongues.
The main idea of this excerpt is to not doubt yourself. Barry begins by using parallelism of the word “certainty” and its opposite, “uncertainty”. This is done to show what scientists need to do when beginning such a task. Without doing so, you really don’t get far and it’s ultimately a waste of your time. So since, as he says, “It is not the courage to accept—indeed, embrace—uncertainty” it’s a clever device used to look at this problem.
John uses diction to explain his next step. He uses cheerful words such as “intelligence and curiosity, but passion, patience, creativity, self-sufficiency, and courage”. These words also have a soft touch to them as if he’s speaking on how a father should be towards his child. By using this strategy, according to John, it should make the process of acquiring a cure much quicker. You should now have no hesitation or uncertainty in what you’re doing at this point.
Barry next gives an example of how even the greatest of scientists can make a misstep but if they had just listened in the beginning, they would have seen they were correct. John says, “Einstein refused to accept his own theory until his predictions were tested, one must seek out such findings.” This quote is essentially given to encourage the scientists to trust in themselves in order for them to accomplish their final goal. Even though Einstein is placed on a pedestal as a genius, he is still makes mistakes like we all do. A scientist ultimately has to be confident in all aspects of his work.
Finally, John encourages us to use wisdom and imagination while experimenting. “In the wilderness the scientist must create… everything.” John promotes clever choices.

Pink Flamingo

America puts its value on a variety of things. Such things as our countries flag and its colors, red, white and blue are held in reverence. The eagle, which symbolizes freedom, is shown as America’s symbol. But of all the strange things to become popular for the United States is another bird. In Jennifer Price’s essay, she speaks of how the flamingo became so popular in America. She talks about how this vibrant bird was brought to everyone’s attention in the early 20th century. After reading her essay, it is easy to conclude that Jennifer believes America to be gullible. I will reveal to you how Jennifer exhibits her view of the United States culture.
Price shows that the flamingo represents the one thing that sparks everyone’s attention: money. Jennifer mainly uses diction to show why this flamingo became so popular. She uses adjectives like “boldness”, “synonymous”, and “pizzazz” that are very forthright and make you draw near to what she has to say. Also these words suggest wealth to explain why this bird seemed to attract the eye of every American. Another reason why money was key in this trend is because the country is finally out of their “great depression” and is urging everyone to move forward.
Although money may seem to be everything in this style of things, color helped tremendously. Price proves this fact using parallelism of the word pink. Of course we know that flamingos are pink because they don’t come in any other shade, but Jennifer realized that for this reason is why the public fell in love. The shade of pink was basically used as a persuasive mechanism to lure all of America. Price uses brash adjectives such as “sassy”, “hot”, and “flamboyant” all to describe this one tint. These words are used to entice and to better help her reader understand exactly what attracted to such an object.
A core entity that still affects people and all of today’s fads is what the “stars” had. If it’s somehow attainable, just about any and everyone attempts to get their hands on it. Although this was more so with the color pink, it all derived from the flamingo. Jennifer states the color pink was so popular it was on “washing machines, cars, and kitchen counters”. Even Elvis Presley’s pink Cadillac was decked out in the flamingo’s shade!
A final aspect of the flamingo’s magnetic affect was that the flamingo was held in reverence in many different religions and countries. From Egypt, to Mexico, to the Caribbean, the flamingo represents all sorts of things. It was used as an instrument of art, dance and even literature. Jennifer says, “Early Christians associated it with the red phoenix.” All these things found in this one bird!
In conclusion, Jennifer Price’s view of the United States is that the country is susceptible to obtain interest in objects that can be as unpretentious as a bird. Although this bird may appear vivid in color, symbolic of money, and even adorned by celebrities, the reasons only appear relevant because of how it is displayed. Because this country is so easy to fool, the flamingo will probably be just another fad that will return just as soon as past crazes have.