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Inhumane Conditions Of Immigrants In The Jungle, By Upton Sinclair

1243 Words5 Pages

The Jungle, by Upton Sinclair written in 1906, tells of inhumane conditions that immigrants faced when coming to industrialized cities of the United States. The book begins with the wedding of Ona Lukoszaite and Jurgis Rudkus to help show the reader how even during these times such as this, immigrants are still mistreated. Their wedding causes them to realize that they have one hundred and more in debt. Jurgis, who believes greatly in the American dream, tells his wife that he will find a job quickly and get them out of their debt. He, as well as other members of his family members go out to find work to get them out of their debts, but whenever they find a job something always seems to go wrong, forcing them to lose their jobs. The lose of …show more content…

He wanted to make others aware of the extreme conditions while working in the meat industry. In his book, he pointed out things such as diseased and rotten meat in hopes of leading to new food and safety laws. One reason for Sinclair to write this book is to let readers be known of harsh conditions that the immigrants in this time were facing. Another thing is he wanted to show advantages of socialism to help with any problems in the cities at this time. Sinclair tries to accomplish this by writing a story about an immigrant family and how they come over to America looking for a better way of living. He incorporates two themes of geography, movement and interaction. Movement is seen throughout the immigrants move from Lithuania to America, and interaction is also shown by how they adapt to the way of life here in …show more content…

Many chapters point out capitalism, Sinclair paints a picture of brutal, inhumane, and violent natures. As the family holds tight to their view of the "American Dream," as the days go on their grip on that view loosens. In chapter 3, page 30, "If you were a sociable person, he was quite willing to enter into conversation with you, and to explain to you the deadly nature of the ptomaines which are found in tubercular pork; and while he was talking with you you could hardly be so ungrateful as to notice that a dozen carcasses were passing him untouched." The people were willing to sell tainted meat without a care. Capitalism in the book is portrayed to be evil, he shows the ugly effects of capitalism on the

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Upton Sinclair's Contributions To The Theme Of Socialism

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All the elements and conflicts presented in the book leads to the theme of socialism. Upton Sinclair is a supporter of the socialist move. To the point of writing this work is to elicit sympathy for the working class and build support for socialism. Everything within the book is criticizing capitalism; the only remedy for the evils of capitalism is socialism (Sinclair). In capitalism, the upper-class keep getting richer by exploiting the lower working class, leaving a wide gap between the wealthy and the impoverished.

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Upton Sinclair reflects the reality of the people during the late 1800’s in his novel The Jungle. In his novel, Sinclair wants to promote Socialism by showing how people lived in the meatpacking plant and under a corrupt government. The inhuman working conditions, combined with the lack of hygiene and a corrupt government, made trying to make a living a total hardships for the low class and the immigrants. The Jungle takes place in Packingtown, Chicago, where the employees work under horrible conditions.

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They also better to identify with Jurgis and his families’ struggles. Sinclair probably also wanted government officials to read the book because they had the power to take immediate action. It is ironic because government officials did take action, just not in the way that Sinclair originally anticipated. Roosevelt passed the Federal meat Inspection Act and the Pure Food and Drug act in response to the book. While this changed America for the better, it did not come in the form of democratic socialism that Sinclair

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This is largely because it showed the middle class the travesty that was happening down in the meat packaging plants. Poor housing, immense poverty, horrible conditions, dangerous work environments, and unsanitary packing plants caused the middle class to be disgusted by all of the real-life events that was transpiring. However, the middle class was mostly concerned with what chemicals, feces, and poisons might be in their food (1). This caused the middle class to become outraged and frightened, which furthered the popularity of Sinclair’s book among people of that time, causing it to still be read even

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Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle” tells the story of Jurgis Rudkus and his immigrant family. In his homeland of Lithuania, Jurgis meets his love, Ona. However, he is denied marriage to her Sometime later, Jurgis tries again to seek her hand, but fins out Ona’s father has died and her family is in debt. Along with his father, Antanas, and Ona’s family: Teta Elzbieta, Marija, Jonas, and six children, Jurgis moves to America to start a new life. They arrive in New York, and soon travel to Chicago.

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What Sinclair meant was that he tried to get the people upset about the working conditions but instead, they worried about the contaminated food and then went to the government about it. The heart was supposed to be the immigrants, harsh conditions as well as the contaminated food but then he hit the stomach which was that unsettle “food”. He didn’t achieve his purpose which upset the stomach. That when they went to the authorities, they called for a reformation of the inspection policy. The people were too worried about what about they put into their body, instead of the workers that had the worse end.

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However, readers at the time were not very concerned about the petty immigrants living on the lower rung of society. Rather, they cared about what affected them most: the condition of the meat they were eating-- and had been eating-- for years, that were produced by some of the very factories mentioned in Sinclair’s novel. For the majority of The Jungle’s readers, the fact that poor immigrants were being exploited was not bothersome. Instead, the fact that the food that readers had been eating for years contained the power to kill them seemed shocking, pushing the nation into a worried frenzy. Readers were disgusted by the facts they were reading, catalyzing the creation of administrations like the FDA.

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Upton Sinclair portrays the economic tension in the United States during the late 19th and early 20th centuries through his novel “The Jungle”. He used the story of a Lithuanian immigrant, Jurgis Rudkus, to show the harsh situation that immigrants had to face in the United States, the unsanitary and unsafe working conditions in the meatpacking plants, as well as the tension between the capitalism and socialism in the United States during the early 1900s. In the late 19th century and early 20th centuries, there were massive immigrants move into the United States, and most of them were from Europe. The protagonist, Jurgis Rudkus, like many other immigrants, have the “America Dream” which they believe America is heaven to them, where they can

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634 Words | 3 Pages

The Bosses squeezed and drained the life of those men. In the book The Jungle written by Upton Sinclair he described the life of a struggling family try to work and stay alive in the filth. The working conditions in the factories were unsafe, unsanitary and people made little. The purpose of this book was for people to become socialist other than capitalist.

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Inequity was a major role throughout the unpleasant days most people of Chicago had to associate with. The whole city of Chicago faced a huge quantity of the despondent years they had to deal with due to the fact of people not caring for the workers. Those that didn’t have to go through this disastrous time, were disheartened, disinherited and finally disconnected from life without respite or any hope of deliverance from these prisons created by those who were able to control with their money. In about 1906, Upton Sinclair published the “The Jungle,” which was written during the unpleasant days of Chicago Illinois. “The Jungle” which was written by Upton Sinclair is a story in which explains how Jurgis Rudkus, and his family, and friends who were from a forest called Lithuania, but migrated to Chicago Illinois in search of happiness.

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This factory abused the hard work of thousands of immigrants. Being the writer he was, and his goal, Upton Sinclair decided to write a book, aiming to convince the U.S population into socialism by writing about this meat-packing factory. In order to collect information, he worked undercover in the meat-packing factory for seven weeks during 1904. The factory was horrible, he said. Many of the workers were horribly hurt, with damaged hands, and there were thousands of rats in this factory, transferring more diseases than one could count.

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1107 Words | 5 Pages

After the first reading The Jungle, it was clear that Sinclair was creating a jungle-like atmosphere to help create the chaotic story of Jurgis and his family. Written during the early 1900s, America was experiencing a lot of change. Immigrants were pouring into the cities across the country searching to achieve the American Dream. Although the immigrants were slowly being replaced by newer immigrants, they struggled to fight against each other to make it big in the cities. Sinclair wanted to expose the corruption of the industries and the immigrants attempts to fit into the capitalistic society.

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950 Words | 4 Pages

1)The American Dream, the idea that lures in thousands of foreigners into the United States yearly. The hopes of second chances, profound prosperity, success by hard work and new beginnings. In the Grapes of Wrath by John Stainflied and The Jungle by Uptown Sinclair, both families in this book are not exception. Soon, these inspired immigrants learn the disastrous effects of being the “lower class” under the control of the rich, the government and the landowners. Both of the book’s themes___ the idea that the most damage both families in these two novels endured was not a direct *result* by those of authority, but in reality *( direct result by their own inclination,,,,)

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1202 Words | 5 Pages

During the time period of the 1900’s, the meat packaging industry in Chicago, as Sinclair mentions in his novel, The Jungle, was a very unsanitary and extremely dangerous workplace that lacked much more than just a few safety precautions. Simple things, such as enforcing hand washing or workers’ rights were unheard of in the working environment. It is clear that Upton Sinclair was trying to expose the worker’s horrendous labor conditions in order to improve their situation, along with the introduction of socialism. Upton Sinclair, in his novel, talks about how a Lithuanian immigrant by the name of Jurgis Rudkus, and his family, travel to Chicago trying to make ends meet. However, they soon realize Chicago was not the place for that.

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