The Plastic Pink Flamingo Rhetorical Analysis

In her essay “The Plastic Pink Flamingo” Jennifer Price looks at the strange popularity of the popular lawn accessory of the 50s, the plastic flamingo. She talks about the history of flamingos, the color pink, and how the color relates to the flamingo. She criticizes Americans for their laziness and ignorance. She begins the passage by describing the importance of flamingos before the 50s. She begins with a critical tone, she uses italics in the sentence, “First, it was a flamingo.” By italicizing this she is basically saying, “Of all things, it was a flamingo.” Price goes on to say the lawn accessory has a lot in common with the city of Las Vegas, yes Vegas. Touching on the ridiculousness of flamingos as lawn decorations. She says that the popularity of the flamingos is like a patch of weeds, annoying and hard to look at. She must really hate Vegas.

She flips this negative opening statement with cheerful quotes about those flashy plastic industries of the 50s. She makes Americans in the 50s look like someone trying to defend Steph Curry, goofy and silly. She continues to do so by further explaining Americans’ obsession with the color pink by giving examples of household items that come in all shades of pink, including Elvis Presley’s pink Cadillac, which isn’t really a household item, but still beloved by Americans. By using this structure, she is able to effectively expand her