Rhetorical Analysis On Florence Kelley

Social Worker and Reformer Florence Kelley in her speech to the National American Suffrage Association, on July 22nd, 1905 advocates for women and child labor laws. Kelley tries to persuade, consequently playing on the audience’s feelings. She begins by expressing reasoning, playing with emotion and stating facts. Kelley is successfully appealing to your conscience and sense of culpability. She places the audience in the factories along with the children.

Beginning from line 85 and continuing to the end of her speech, the speaker strengthens her argument by telling everyone exactly what needs to be done to fix the injustice of child labor. She specifies that “There is one line of actions… We can enlist the workingmen on behalf of our enfranchisement…” demonstrating what they, as a collective group needs to do. Because this creates a sense of unity and purpose within the audience to eliminate child labor by gaining the right to vote to do so. Kelley emphasizes throughout her speech that with the enfranchisement of women, child labor could have been prevented from the very

Besides the previously mentioned depressing imagery, a notable point she makes is an interesting connection between women and children’s rights. This is seen when Kelley states that, “If the mothers and the teachers in Georgia could vote, would the Georgia Legislature have refused at every session for the last three years to stop the work in the mills of children under twelve years of age?” This statement notes the lack of political power and representation that certain groups of people, primarily women in this context, had at the time. By drawing attention to the fact that women did not have the right to vote, she sought to emphasize the inequality and injustice in the legislative decision-making process. Kelley implied that if these marginalized groups, who were directly affected by child labor and its consequences, had the right to participate in the democratic process, they would have advocated for laws to protect children from the harsh conditions of factory work.

On July 22, 1905, children’s rights activist, Florence Kelley, addressed the issue of child labor in her speech at the National American Suffrage Association in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Throughout the speech, Kelley calls attention to the harsh working conditions and long hours that the working children, especially the young girls, endure in factories and mills. Kelley adopts a passionate tone to emphasize her dedication to the child labor movement and to persuade others to contribute to the movement in order to prevent the oppression that the working children face. Kelley employs repetition to emphasize the long hours that the children work, oxymoron to contrast the opportunities of the children to the conditions of working in mills, and rhetorical questions to point out the actions not being taken by legislatures and voting men. The first rhetorical device Kelley utilizes is the repetition of the phrase “tonight while we sleep” to emphasize the importance of what the rest of society does while the children work (18).

In the eighth paragraph, Kelley wonders that if women and teachers could vote in Georgia “would the Georgia Legislature have refused…to stop the work in the mills of children under twelve years of age?” The rhetorical question implies that granting women the right to vote would lead to the abolishment of child labor since they could now vote to prevent young children from working in factories, improving the lives and education of thousands of children. By asking this question, Kelley causes the audience to consider what they can do to help pass laws restricting child labor. In paragraph eleven, Kelley again employs a rhetorical question that asks “what can we do to free our consciences?” By providing a rhetorical question that asks the audience what they can do to help free the children with limited resources encourages them to speak to men who can vote and support the common goal to end child

Kelley uses strong centralizing diction, such as “We have, in this country, two million children under the age of sixteen who are earning their bread” (1-3), to make her listeners aware of what’s going on in their own country regarding children. Since the people at this convention are women suffrage supporters, they might not be aware of the extent of child labor present. By using words such as “we” and “in this country”, it solidifies that the convention attendees can be a part of the solution due to them being part of the United States. As a result, the people listening to her speech are being persuaded first to fight for women's suffrage in order to help these children who don’t have a voice. The unification encourages the audience to look for a solution for children working in harsh conditions because they have the ability to make a

As a young girl, she was innocent and unaware of all the discrimination in the south. Growing up, Anne has dealt with severe poverty and is often the one bringing income to her family’s home along with her mother. Her employers are a huge factor as to why she is so drawn to the movement. For instance, when Anne learned about Emmitt Till being killed, she ran to her mother for an explanation but her mother had replied “…just do your work like you don’t know nothing… that boy’s a lot better off in heaven than he is here” (262). Her mother brushing off the death of Emmitt Till took the best of her curiosities and she questioned why her mother was acting so afraid although it was obvious that.

Florence Kelley - Rhetorical Essay Brayden Jones, LaNasia Steward, Jenna McKee, Kyle Hanes Intro Florence Kelley was a women’s rights activist who held a lifelong legacy as a patriot of women’s rights and children’s rights. Although she gave hundreds of speeches during her lifetime, one in particular stands out. On July 22, 1905, Kelley addressed members of the National American Woman Suffrage Association before a convention that the association held in Philadelphia. During her speech, she urged listeners to take part in stopping unrestrained work hours for children.

Kelley could not make this point any clearer, with her last proclamation being, “For the sake of the children, for the Republic in which these children will vote after we are dead, and for the sake of our cause, we should enlist the workingmen voters, with us, in this task of freeing the children from toil” (92-96)! Besides the glaring attempt to convince the other women that they require the help of other men to help the children, she also says “with us.” Her exclamation shows that she knows that to end child labor it will take support from all groups of people, men and women alike, given that women themselves are provided the opportunity to vote. Her borderline anger shows the raw passion she has for the subject and how

Kelley compares contrasting words as she notes, “Now, therefore, in New Jersey, boys and girls, after their 14th birthday, enjoy the pitiful privilege of working all night long” (6). Kelley is able to create a sense of compassion for the children throughout her audience by using contradicting words such as pitiful and privilege to make the men and women at the convention ponder about the morbid reality of young children working in harsh conditions. Kelley uses the word “privilege” as almost ironic contrast to the pitiful situation convincing the suffragists at the convention to take action against intensive working conditions. Hence, Kelley is able to convince the men and women at the convention to advocate for women’s suffrage through putting conflicting words together to sway the audience to support her cause for voting rights for women. Kelley continues to remind the audience that in order to take the burden of a pitiful privilege off of children, they first need to gain voting rights to make their stances

United States social worker and reformer Florence Kelley, in her speech to the National American Woman Suffrage Association in Philadelphia on July 22, 1905, emphasizes the dire need to reform the working conditions of children across the country. Throughout the speech, Kelley strives to make the audience aware of the terrible hours and conditions that children face, and to compel the listeners at the convention to empathize with the children in their situation. Kelley adopts a compelling, yet passionate tone in order to call the listeners to action to help the child workers, while still demonstrating how much she truly believes in solving the issue. Kelley employs repetition of phrases in order to emphasize the lack of involvement from the

By choosing to include such a strong sense of pathos, she was able to promote an effective argument that was appropriate for her intended audience; the National American Woman Suffrage Association. The use of pathos, as seen in lines 18-19, “Tonight while we sleep, several thousand little girls will be working in textile mills, all the night through” constructs a sense of guilt, she

In her speech to the National American Woman Suffrage Association, Florence Kelly descriptively vocalizes about chid labor. She talks about the horrible conditions young children face in the states. Kelly uses repetition to put emphasis on little girls working in textile mills, “while we sleep” is repeated 3 times this makes the audience feel guilty for enjoying life while little girls are working. Kelly also uses pathos, appealing to the emotion of her

Florence Kelley Rhetoric Children 13 years old are working 12 hours at night during the 1900’s. What did we do to ty and fix this? Florence Kelley was a united states social worker and reformer who tried to abolish child labor laws and tried to improve women's working conditions. She delivered a speech in 1905 to insPire the people of that time to vote against these child labor laws. Florence Kelley uses repetition,statistics and rhetorical questions to develop her claim that the people of that time need to vote against child labor laws.

By allowing themselves to not have a say, and just hang back in the shadow creates an issue among society. As the women of GIlead right’s are abruptly taken, they have no way to stand up for themselves and have a voice in the belief that they deserve rights. The women of Gilead become objectified to the point where their only purpose is to procreate and continue until they may not create any longer. They are treated as things, and they are not seen to have emotions or thoughts. They have no basic rights.