Summary Of Upton Sinclair's The Jungle

Words: 553
Pages: 3

The Jungle: The Jungle was a novel written by Upton Sinclair in 1906 that highlighted the harsh conditions of the lives of immigrants in such industrialized cities, particularly the Chicago Stockyards. The novel also exposed the meatpacking industry with its corruption and bad practices. This included unsanitary and unsafe conditions in the slaughterhouses and in production. The release of this novel to the public helped to draw in sympathy for the working class and garner support for the Socialist movement. As a result, Sinclair’s novel inspired federal laws that regulated meat, food, drugs, which eventually led to the passage of the Meat Inspection Act and also the Pure Food and Drug Act.
Muckrakers:
Muckrakers was a term given to American journalists (by President Roosevelt in 1906) during the Progressive Era whose publications, typically investigative, emphasized on exposing the corruption, scandals, “muck” and bad practices in society at the time. Some of the more well renowned muckraker journalists included Upton Sinclair, Ida Tarbell, and Lincoln Steffens, all of whom were reform-minded. The works of the muckrakers intended to generate public awareness of the
…show more content…
One notable works that utilized yellow journalism was William Randolph Hearst’s New York Journal of how it “sensationalized” the news using “melodrama, romance, and hyperbole” in order to hype up circulation. Another notable work was Joseph Pulitzer’s New York World piece. As a result of their works, both Pulitzer and Hearst’s works are often seen as a catalyst to the United States’ entry into the Spanish-American War by motivating the readers to place blame on the Spanish with the sinking of the Maine and “unrighteous” detailing of female prisoners, executions, and starving women and