Essay Outline: a Modest Proposal

Words: 1024
Pages: 5

Outline: A Modest Proposal

I. Introduction
A. Audience Participation
1. How many of you see poverty and hunger as a problem in the world? How many of you think that you cannot possibly help solve this problem?
B. Introduce self and topic
1. According to an article written by Jason M. Breslow, as of 2011, children had the highest poverty level with over 16 million children living in poverty. That is just in the United States. Imagine the number of children living in poverty in the entire world.
2. My name is Alice and I will present to you the satirical styles of Jonathan Swift and explain why “A Modest Proposal” will lead people in the right direction to help those in poverty.
3. Before I continue, here is the definition of
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Wealthy people would pay about 10 shillings for a child after the first year of nursing. He suggests that the skin be used to make “summer gloves for ladies, and summer boots for fine gentlemen,” (Swift 764). The city will have to arrange for slaughter-houses, and recommend that butchers buy children alive then prepare them for selling.
2. Swift goes on to list a number of possible alternative solutions that others may find more appropriate. Some of these suggestions are to start taxing at five shillings per pound, stop using furniture and clothes from other countries and begin using items from their own manufacturers, and teaching landlords to show mercy toward their tenants. (Swift 767).
a. While dismissing the alternative solutions that could also help the people in poverty, Swift reveals his actual point. His point is that no one must object the proposal or propose other methods unless someone is seriously willing to take those actions.
III. Conclusion
A. The purpose of this essay was to propose an idea that was so ridiculous that the people of Ireland would realize the simpler solutions and begin to take action in order to not only help the people in poverty, but to help their entire country “by advancing trade, providing for infants, relieving the poor, and giving some pleasure to the rich” (Swift 768).
B. Swift ends his essay by stating that he has no children who he can sell for money since his youngest child is nine