Exploring the Text

1. In the opening paragraph, Upton Sinclair describes the outrage of workers at the physician’s insistence that kerosene be used on spoiled meat. What is their chief concern?

   Question

   ALMF/kS1zzW73MouRsoXk1h0lKY=

   Exploring the Text: - In the opening paragraph, Upton Sinclair describes the outrage of workers at the physician’s insistence that kerosene be used on spoiled meat. What is their chief concern?
2. What does Sinclair mean by the description “regular alchemists” (par. 3)?

   Question

   ALMF/kS1zzW73MouRsoXk1h0lKY=

   Exploring the Text: - What does Sinclair mean by the description “regular alchemists” (par. 3)?
3. What is the “separate little inferno, in its way as horrible as the killing-beds, the source and fountain of them all” (par. 4)?

   Question

   ALMF/kS1zzW73MouRsoXk1h0lKY=

   Exploring the Text: - What is the “separate little inferno, in its way as horrible as the killing-beds, the source and fountain of them all” (par. 4)?
4. How does Sinclair develop and support his argument that the work in these factories is dehumanizing because of both the nature of the work and the powerlessness of the workers?

   Question

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   Exploring the Text: - How does Sinclair develop and support his argument that the work in these factories is dehumanizing because of both the nature of the work and the powerlessness of the workers?
5. What unsafe practices does Sinclair emphasize in this section? How would you characterize his descriptions? Are they exaggerated? Gruesome? Detached? Melodramatic?

   Question

   ALMF/kS1zzW73MouRsoXk1h0lKY=

   Exploring the Text: - What unsafe practices does Sinclair emphasize in this section? How would you characterize his descriptions? Are they exaggerated? Gruesome? Detached? Melodramatic?
6. In a 1906 issue of Cosmopolitan magazine, Sinclair wrote of his disappointment that the American public focused on food reform rather than on the larger social critique of the difficult lives of workers: “I aimed at the public’s heart, and by accident I hit it in the stomach.” How does this quote demonstrate Sinclair’s point? Or does it?

   Question

   ALMF/kS1zzW73MouRsoXk1h0lKY=

   Exploring the Text: - In a 1906 issue of Cosmopolitan magazine, Sinclair wrote of his disappointment that the American public focused on food reform rather than on the larger social critique of the difficult lives of workers: “I aimed at the public’s heart, and by accident I hit it in the stomach.” How does this quote demonstrate Sinclair’s point? Or does it?