Summary Of The Plastic Pink Flamingo

In the essay “The Plastic Pink Flamingo: A Natural History,” (1999), Jennifer Price details the natural history of American culture and its pretentious ideals, while criticizing Americans for their frivolity during the 1900’s. Price illuminates her ideas by utilizing colorful diction, irony, alliteration, and a pink flamingo as a symbol of American destructiveness and superficiality. Utilizing pop culture references, Price’s purpose is to highlight American culture for being obsessed with trends and commercializing them instead of appreciating the genuine beauty within them. Price’s ostensible audience are American people to whom she addresses in a satirical tone while poking fun of for being ignorant and materialistic. Price commences her essay with a critical tone and colorful diction to ridicule the flamboyance when pink flamingos “splashed” into the fifties market. She utilizes verbs associated with flamingos such as “flocking” to portray how American culture transformed a prestigious and unique item that represented “wealth” and “pizzaz” into something commercialized. This evolution of the pink flamingo reveals the destructiveness of Americans and our culture that consumes any and everything for the sake of status. Price provides insight on how the plastic

Shortly after, Price utilizes a short, blunt, declarative sentence “But no matter” to express how ignorant American culture is and their dismissive attitudes toward the flamingos that were killed earlier in history and subsequently evolve into a materialistic and frivolous item. Price’s utilization of colorful diction is continued when describing the flamingo’s connection with “leisure and extravagance” due to its expansion from Florida to the city of Las