Omnivore's Dilemma Chapter 18

Omnivore's Dilemma Ch.18

AP Lang + Comp, Period 1

Joshua Le, Serena Lowe, Samantha Shaw

Implications of Pollan’s topics

Rhetorical Modes

Process Analysis

“The experience of hunting suggest another theory. Could it be that the cannabinoid network is precisely the sort of adaptation that natural selection would favor in the evolution of a creature who survives by hunting? A brain chemical that sharpens the sense, narrows your mental focus, allows you to forget everything extraneous to the task at hand...” (342)

Pollan constantly refers back to how the food industry is constantly cranking out food that is rich in carbon emission and water pollution. Trying to find a safer, healthier alternative to this toxic lifestyle, he tries to experience a possible alternative to vegetarian food: hunting game. As he goes out to experience fresh food directly from the forest, he learns that hunting is a complicated concept. In the end, he is unable to reach a conclusion about the morals of pride and shame involved with hunting animals and feasting on them.

This rhetorical mode convey the mentality that hunters have when they kill the pigs. By breaking down their mentality, Pollan is able to adapt to a hunter’s mentality and kill a pig in the wild.

Rhetorical Modes

Illustration - Example

Hunting animals provides animals free of pesticides, and their wastes naturally nourish land of the earth in order to continue the healthy life cycle of nature. Game is organic food that is highly beneficial to the health of individuals as well as improving the environment overall. Hunting, however, is not a realistic option for our society, which is accustomed to having any type of food during any time of the year. Additionally, if everyone was hunting, animal species would not be able to keep up with the death ratio. The ecosystem would also be destroyed as thousands of species would be lost.

Problem Solution

“The line between human and animal that I could discern here was nowhere near that sharp. Cannibalism is one of the things that most deeply disgusts us, and while this isn’t by any reasonable definition that, you could forgive the mind for being fooled into reacting as if it were--in disgust.”(358)

Knowing that hunting has it's benefits for the natural world, Pollan understands that hunting is not a "evil" activity. However, after seeing how proud he was to kill an animal, he is embarrassed of his behavior. Pollan struggles to come to a conclusion, but realizes that to be fed, animals need to be killed, but a way to "cope" with their death is by killing and eating animals with gratitude and respect.

Pollan uses this to demonstrate how cannibalism is one the examples of how disgust is perceived to be disgusting where in reality some animals perform this lifestyle yet it is socially acceptable from our eyes.

Rhetorical Modes

Narrative/Descriptive

“The fact that you cannot come out of hunting feeling unambiguously good about it is perhaps what should commend the practice to us. You certainly don’t come out of it eager to protest your innocence. If I’ve learned anything about hunting and eating meat it’s that it’s even messier that the moralist thinks, Having killed a pig and looked at myself in that picture and now looking forward to eating that pig, I have to say there is a part of me that envies the moral clarity of the vegetarian, the blamelessness of the tofu eater” (361-362).

Pollan describes his major dilemma during the hunting process: how to get over killing an animal. He reflects his best to understand and comprehend the situation at hand in order to remove the guilt bearing down his shoulders of slaughtering the animal in order to survive on its meat, yet he quickly ends this problem by resolving to a temporary option of going vegetarian.

Hunting: The Meat

“I could not believe Angelo was still taking about food. The pig was splayed open now, all its internal organs glistening in their place like one of those cutaway anatomy dolls from biology: the bluish links of intestine coiled…” (353).

Pollan uses imagery and figurative language (simile, etc) to describe the physical features of the pig to convey the grotesque image of the lifeless hanging pig in order to allude to the differences between a free-roaming pig from a “factory” raised pig.

“The pig, a sow weighing perhaps a hundred pounds, was too heavy to carry, so we took turns dragging it by its rear..” (347).

Pollan uses imagery to convey the imagery of the free pig, now dead, to showcase how natural and authentic the pig feels compared to a farm pig. In addition, this pig is also really rich in meat indicating how wild pigs can become large like farm raised pigs.

Rhetorical Devices

Humans have the ability to see animals and continue to eat them. After hunting and killing a pig, Pollan realizes that he cannot be unambiguously happy about what he has done. Unable to decide if the right emotion as a hunter is shame or pride, recognizes that animals should be killed and eaten with respect and gratitude.

Simile, Metaphor, Onomatopoeia: “The crystal stillness of the scene and the moment in time now exploded into a thousand shards of sense. The pigs erupted in panic, moving every which way at once like black bumper cards, and then blam!” (352)

Pollan uses these rhetorical devices to illustrate the moment. The intensity of the hunting atmosphere is illustrated by using sound effects to mimic the clashing of the pigs. This creates imagery for the reader.

Rhetorical Strategies

Personification: "Death was quickly overtaking her” (352).

The use of personification allows the reader to comprehend the overall emphasis of the pig and how its death was a moment in Pollan's experience that begins to change his mindset on the topic of hunting.

“And under the bright fluorescence under the 7-Eleven, in the mirror behind the cigarette rack behind the cashier, I caught a glimpse of this grungy pair of self-satisfied animal killers and noted the wide berth the other customers in line were only too happy to grant them. Us.” (337)

Simile: “I felt as though I had stumbled on some stranger’s pornography” (360).

The use of syntax in this sentence tells a short story to the reader. The use of lengthy sentence structure portrays a story being told within that sentence until Pollan hits readers with the one word sentence. He transitions from lengthy sentences into a short sentence in order to emphasize and dawn upon the reader the truth that he learned during his experience.

Aristotelian Appeal:

Ethos

Pollan uses this simile to intensify the fear he felt when he saw himself in the photo. Seeing himself as a different person, Pollan uses this device to show he is emotionally perplexed when he begins to understand the meaning of his experience,

“What was that? Just a bird. Everything is amplified. Even my skin is alert...” (335). “What should I do? This time my gun was cocked, of course, and now, for the first time, I took off the safety. Should I shoot? No, you wait, Angelo said. See- they’re coming down the hill now.” (351)

Pollan's use of short, descriptive sentences provide a contrast to lengthy sentences. The choppy sentences make the reader feel present in the scene because the reader is able to see the rushed thought process that Pollan experiences.

Aristotelian Appeal: Logos

“I kneeled down and pressed the palm of my hand against the pig’s belly above the nopples and felt beneath the dusty, bristly skin her warmth, but no heartbeat” (353).

Pollan going out to experience hunting himself. He has the evidence and real life experience, compared to him simply saying he he imagined it would be like and basing his argument on assumption.

“As Rozin has written, most of the things that disgust people universally do come from animals--bodily fluids and secretions, decaying flesh, corpses. This makes meat eating especially problematic, which might explain why cultures have more rules and taboos governing the eating of meat than any other food…” (357).

Aristotelian Appeal: Pathos

Pollan enlists us with a paradox that makes us ponder the nature of humanity since it describes how humans eat meat yet we are repulsed by the very thought of corpses and dead bodies. He breaks down the thought process into thinking how rules of eating meat have been established among today's culture.

“There was the one about the sow Angelo couldn’t bring himself to shoot because her piglets were trailing behind"(340).

Pollan causes the reader to feel sympathetic for the pigs that are being hunting in order to gravitate an emotional response towards the life of the pig. He opens our eyes into a connection with the pigs to relate how the death of the pig will render the piglets vulnerable to the dangers of the wilderness. Pollan is also trying to get us to feel the same sensitivity that he initially felt when he was out in the woods hunting.