Rhetorical Analysis Of Made In Hell By Dana Liebelson

“Made in Hell”, written by Dana Liebelson, is an article in which she describes the sumangali condition in painstaking detail and provides a complicated story that challenges the reader. Their exploitation is explained in a way that makes the reader stand face to face with the consequences of their own consumption and the acknowledgment of where their goods come from. This is done to make the reader empathize with the sumangali worker whose lives and bodies are exploited in the process. Liebelson takes on a vast topic and uses a few rhetorical appeals that effectively make the reader understand the sumangali life while simultaneously dissecting the corrupt system they are forced into.

Beginning with Ethos, three examples have been identified.

The appeal to reason is one that Liebelson uses liberally by commenting on the workers’ sexual abuse, meager pay, and dangerous work conditions. The author talks about a 16-year-old that “was badly injured by a machine belt that snapped and hit her eye”, workers being subjected to “between 8 and 13 hours daily, plus overnight shifts”, and much more (Liebelson 49). By writing about these conditions extensively, Liebelson appeals to the reasonable reader who understands them. At no point does she outright denounce the mills or their connected companies, but she does give the necessary context for the reader to formulate their own opinions against them. Liebelson is more focused on the impact the factories had on the workers than the factories themselves and because of this, she makes it a secondary point to make an argument against the mills. However, in a way, she is telling the reader to think rationally and that there is no need for a case to be made - the factories are intrinsically evil. To support her article, Liebelson often cites statistics and uses numbers to aptly describe the nature of the situation. Most notably she cites the ages of the sumangali workers and statistics regarding money. She states that the girls can begin working as young as 13 and this number is repeated in different contexts multiple times to nail home the point of child labor. Making a child work all day long at such a young age, in an extremely dangerous environment to boot, paints a picture that Liebelson uses to her advantage. She also talks about how they are often promised salaries, such as “250 rupees (about $4)”, and are actually paid much lower salaries, like $2.50 a day (Liebelson 48). The evidence that she provides bolsters her argument and makes for a compelling read that is not just based on emotion, but verifiable facts. The main focus