Birds dying, leaves covered with deadly powder, chemicals floating through the air. These were all issues faced globally in the 1950’s and 60’s due to the use of dangerous pesticides such as DDT, chlordane, and heptachlor. Though several scientists conducted studies that proved the issues with pesticides, the first person to make a lasting impression on America was Rachel Carson, author of Silent Spring. Her writing not only discussed the environmental issues that Americans faced in the 1960’s, but also served as the catalyst for the environmental movement as we know it today. Rachel Carson was born in 1907 in Springdale, Pennsylvania during the height of the Industrial Age (Griswold 8). Her mother, Maria Carson, was an avid bird-watcher and …show more content…
“Carson used the era’s hysteria about radiation to snap her readers to attention, drawing a parallel between nuclear fallout and a new, invisible chemical threat of pesticides throughout Silent Spring,” (Griswold 21). She described radiation as the creation of human’s tampering with nature, and warned that similar dangers would become inevitable with the continued use of pesticides (Carson 7). Carson also knew that a large percent of her audience would be housewives, who she could use as example of those who found poisoned birds and squirrels in their gardens. She angled much of Silent Spring towards this audience, which helped her book become the catalyst for environmental change (Griswold …show more content…
In 1989, seventy five percent of Americans identified themselves as environmentalists, and the number has continued to grow since then (Walls 1). Environmentalism is now the most popular social movement in the United States, with over five million American families donating regularly to environmental organizations (Walls 1). Environmentalists today focus on what kind of world they hope to see in the future, and largely deal with limiting pollution and changing consumption rates (Kent 1 and 9). Modern environmentalists also have much different issues than those Carson’s America faced. With climate change becoming more threatening each year, protection of the natural world is needed more than ever. Pollution has caused the warmest decade in history, the deterioration of the ozone layer, and species extinction in extreme numbers (Hunter 2). It not only threatens nature, but also human populations, who already suffer from lack of clean water and poisoning from toxic chemicals (Hunter 16). Unlike environmental actions in the 1960’s, which were mostly focused on protection, a massive increase in pollution has caused efforts to be focused on environmental restoration (Hunter 16). Like in the time of Silent Spring, environmentalists are not only concerned with one country. Protecting the environment remains a global issue, and every nation is threatened by the
By citing credible organizations and offering her own eco-friendly alternatives, she proves to the reader that she takes a particular interest in the environment and is educated to speak on it. Pairing powerful understatements and hyperboles to contrast with one another show the reader that the practice is both needless and selfish. These rhetorical techniques have a powerful impact on the reader, whose ignorance prior to reading the excerpt can no longer suffices to excuse the lack of action. Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring is a deeply persuasive book that not only advocates for an end to pesticides but also speaks to the obligation humans hold to protect their
The Baby Boomer generation and the time period has a lasting effect on the economy and the environment. The baby boom for the United States was similar to other countries after World War II. Several economies also blossomed, but overall with very little care for the environment. After World War II the use of industrial made chemicals increased in popularity throughout the United States and the world (The “New Environmentalism” OF THE 1960S). The chemical DDT was originally being used widespread to eradicate disease vectors, such as mosquito carrying Malaria ("The DDT Story."). DDT influenced more than just mosquitoes as it had lasting effects in the environment where it noticeably bioaccumulate in the food chain and caused high mortality in young bald eagles ("The DDT Story."). Rachel Carson’s book, Silent Spring released to the public in 1962 which is the time period in which environmental health and human health were connected (The “New
Ehrlich, P. R., & Ehrlich, A. H. (1996). Betrayal of science and reason: How anti-environmental rhetoric threatens our future. Washington, D.C: Island Press.
In the introduction of “Silent Spring” written by Rachel Carson in 1962, more than 50 years ago the writer attempts to warn us that human beings will end by destroying the earth in the opening quote. She shows that human beings are causing harmful effects to the environment and the environment becomes polluted day by day. First, to lead to the issue, the author starts with a fable. She describes a beautiful natural town, but then the appearance of human beings brought a strange blight and everything began to change. Stillness, illness, disease, and death emerged in the town. Although the town in this story is not a reality, but the events in this town is happening truly around the world. The author uses points through the introduction of the book to explain, support main idea. Time is one of the important themes in this reading. She says that “time not in years but in millennia”, it took a long time to produce the life that now inhabits the earth, for life adjusts and balance has been reached. However, the earth changes rapidly due to the impetuous and heedless pace of man. People bring toxics to the earth that would require time on the scale and life of generations to adjust these things. People create chemicals, synthetics that introduced along with radiation harm the environment and organisms. The toxic productions are introduced to the environment but people hardly know about the devils of their own creation. These productions cause negative effects such as kill vegetation, sicken cattle, and cause the polluted air. People use chemicals to control the insects but this method has had only limited success. Day by day, insects adapt these chemicals to survive, become stronger and more difficult to control. In the end, the chemicals lose. The writer also says that monoculture (single-crop farming system) does not take advantage of the principles by which nature works, people is simplifying the nature that has introduced variety. Rachel Carson suggests using polyculture (grow many crops in a field) 50 years ago. People also have to face with the modern insect problem. Because of the isolation from one continent to another, insect developed many new species. These species began to move out into new territories that is receiving considerable assistance from man. Although people know the necessary knowledge - chemicals, synthetics are harmful for the earth and human beings - but they do not use it.
Have you ever thought about how your fruits and vegetables are grown? How about which ingredients are put into bug sprays and insecticides to ward off those pesky insects? Look no further because author Rachel Carson looks deep into the many environmental issues caused by pesticides and herbicides in her New York Times best-selling novel, “Silent Spring.” “Silent Spring” is a collection of studies which were performed in an effort to educate others about the harmful things occurring everyday to their foods and every-day environment in hopes of giving them a wake up call. This novel is thought by many to be a revolutionary novel that forced people to take notice of the harm being caused in their world, many of which people were unaware of. After discovering the results of these chemicals, it really makes one wonder, is the luxury of being insect free really worth all of the consequences?
Silent Spring is an environmental non-fiction book written by Rachel Carson and published in 1962. The title is a reflection of the world pure in its nature and unperturbed by human influence. The book plays a role of intriguing the audience about the damages that have occurred on the earth due to the indiscriminate human activities by the use of pesticides. The book is geared towards spurring a revolutionary change in the laws affecting our air, land, and water. During this period, industrialization was pushing individuals towards conformity and thus the world was experiencing human development without taking into consideration the environmental damages.
There are multiple points in Silent Spring that make the book so noteworthy in the history of environmentalism. The first being that Carson shows how the common person isn’t extremely informed about the pesticides that are being used every day all over their fields, homes and towns. Also they know nothing about how irreversible most of the damage is. Carson points out, “The most alarming of all mans assaults upon the environment is the contamination of air, earth, rivers, and sea with dangerous and even lethal materials. This pollution is for the most part irrecoverable; the chain of evil it initiates not onl...
Silent Spring is one of the most important books of the environmental movement. It was one of the first scientific books to talk about destruction of habitat by humans. As a result, one can imagine that Ms. Rachel Carson needed to be quite persuasive. How does she achieve this? In this excerpt from Silent Spring, Carson utilizes the rhetorical devices of hyperbole, understatement, and rhetorical questions to state the necessity of abolishing the practice of using poisons such as parathion. Carson starts out by using the symbiotic nature of hyperbole and understatement to paint the whole practice as dangerous and unnecessary. She further strengthens her argument by using rhetorical questions to make her readers see the ethical flaws and potential casualties caused by deadly pesticides.
In Rachel Carson’s “Silent Spring”, the book says, “In 1962, scientists and author Rachel Carson published Silent Spring as a warning to the public about the environmental risks…”(Carson 27). This quote specifies that Rachel Carson has to take responsibility for releasing that information to the public not knowing what they would do with it. Another quote from the text states, “Then a strange blight crept over the area and everything began to change. Some evil spell had settled on the community: mysterious maladies swept the locks of chicken, the cattle and sheep sickened and ded. Everywhere was a shadow of death.”(Carson 28). This quote shows what the chemical is doing to the town and the damage it
In the article "The Obligation to Endure", an excerpt from "Silent Spring", Carson focuses on her major concerns with the environment. For millennia, Mother Nature was the lone modifier that possessed the ability to shape the environment. In turn, this caused species to adapt for survival. However, with the birth of man, the delicate balance has shifted. Humans now possess the ability to alter the makeup of their environment. This is a power that shouldn 't be taken lightly or abused. However, humans are often blind to corruption until it 's too late, and so the inevitable happened. Man abused its power and failed to see the consequences. This is an overarching concern of Carson, "The most alarming of all man 's assaults upon the environment is the contamination of air, earth, rivers, and sea with dangerous and even lethal materials (Carson)." The chemicals dumped into rivers the pollution pumped into the air. The toxic radiation released from nuclear explosions in the form of Strontium 90. The endless pesticides sprayed on crops and trees. All of these are the weapons used in "man 's war against nature
Americans had knowledge of the events taking place during the war, but Carson shed a light on the ripple effects that the environment was experiencing. Silent Spring brings the focus to different threats that had arisen because of the war. In a way, Carson places the blame for the deterioration of the environment on mankind as a whole. In the past, wars had been fought without any use of nuclear weaponry. Carson’s writing really emphasizes the fault of mankind’s decision to hurt the environment. “Along with the possibility of extinction of mankind by nuclear war, the central problem of our age has therefore become the contamination of man’s total environment with such substances of incredible potential for harm – substances that accumulate in the tissues of plants and animals and even penetrate the germ cells to shatter or alter the very material of heredity upon which the shape of the future depends.” (Carson, 181). The writing technique Carson uses in Silent Spring has a way of making the reader feel guilty, especially considering that at the time of publication there was so much environmental destruction occurring. Carson’s writing helped to educate the American population of the harm to the environment caused by the Cold War. Because the war’s dangerous strategies provided such a strong backbone for Carson’s argument, the American public was very receptive of the content and themes presented in Silent
In August 1945, the United States dropped nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. When she began writing Silent Spring in the 1950s, Carson was acutely aware of the short and long term impacts of these events (Carson, 1962). As a naturalist and scientists, she worried about the long term effects of nuclear fallout and the misuse of pesticides. Her work for the U.S. Department of Fisheries gave her unique insight into the rapid ecological system changes due to pesticide use and our own culpability in creating the insect and pest problem to begin with (Biography, 2011).
Carson was born on May 27, 1907 in Springdale, Pennsylvania. And died on April 14, 1964 weakened from breast cancer then suffered a heart attack. She was a very adventurous little girl, which that probably explains a lot about her career as an adult. Her family owned a 65-acre farm where she spent most of her childhood exploring and learning new things about the world around her. She had a strong heart for animals and the outdoors. At age eight she wrote stories, frequently involving animals. And at age eleven she had published her first story. Carson attended Springdale's small scho...
Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring revolutionized the American point of view concerning the environment. It rejected the notion that pesticides and chemicals are the right choice for “controlling” various animals that are seen as an inconvenience. Carson writes about the dangers of pesticides, not only to nature but man himself.
I remember when I first thought about the power one person could have to create change. I was a teenager growing up in the South when I read Rachel Carson’s book “Silent Spring”. This beautifully written book is a powerful indictment of the widespread use of pesticides. Rachel Carson criticized the chemical companies for claiming that pesticides were safe despite mounting evidence to the contrary. And she criticized public officials who accepted the chemical industry’s claims.