Rehugo:Government

Kathleen Alonzo

Mr. Soeth

English 3AP

February 18, 2011

REHUGO Analysis – Government

A. Articles Read:

a. Working Mothers Are Benefiting the Family

b. Working Mothers Are Harming the Family

B. Articles Attached

C.

a. The argument being issued in the article, Working Mothers Are Benefiting the Family, argues that mothers who work teach their children to be independent, curious, and ambitious. Children will be able to receive the value of personal fulfillment and a life of success by following in their mother’s footsteps.

b. On the other hand in the article, Working Mothers Are Harming the Family argues the total opposite. The author argues that society should support women who choose to raise their children full time instead of women who abandon their children to day care providers because society pressures them to.

D. Evidence

a. “I saw her debating things with my father, also a teacher, as an equal, personally, professionally and financially. I marched off into adult life thinking this was the way things were, and I and the succession of female bosses I've had all had our lives made easier.” The author uses ethos, by using his own experience of his mother and how she helped him become early familiar with the ways of life in the work force as he grew older. “I look at my own mother, who raised seven children while working as a college teacher and librarian, and I think this is one of the great favors she did me.” Again the author establishes ethos. With ethos the author implies that his mother’s success in working was a positive impact on him.

b. "When I returned to work [full time], I left behind a gnawing sense of oppression, boredom, and guilt that had cast a pall over my maternity leave." The statement incorporates both ethos and pathos, describing the guilt the author felt when she exceeded her maternity leave in order to writing her book. "Almost three hundred American employers, including Aetna, Eastman Kodak, Cigna, and Home Depot, now offer 'lactation support rooms' …” The author provides logos and ethos, stating quantitative data on the amount of businesses that allow women to pump breast milk for their children in day care.

E. Rhetorical Strategies

a. There is repetition using the word “example” in the article Working Mothers Are Benefiting the Family. The repetition of example creates a solid foundation in the reader’s mind that mothers should lead by example and by setting a good example, children are more likely to pick it up and make it a habit to set the same example. In this case, mother’s set examples as their children see how hard they are working to make a living for the family. “As a teenager, I remember visiting friends whose mothers seemed way too wrapped up in their high school lives. I found myself glad my own mother was too busy to worry about whether I had a chance of being elected prom king.” Karaim is able to create exemplification, using his own experience and story, that his mother being involved in work was something positive.

b. The author manages to establish rhetorical questions such as, “But where does this guilt come from? Is there one television show, for example, that portrays working mothers in anything but a heroic light?” The rhetorical questions provide a tentative statement without giving an outright declaration. The questions lean towards the authors theme of guilt of working mothers. “Work is an act of historical redemption for all those centuries of oppression and sexism.“ The statement is a definition of what work is and how work was something women wanted to be a part of and fought throughout history.

F. Parents who choose to revolve their life more around world are more likely to miss out in the involvement in their child’s life. The greatest example of a parent would be best achieved by their children when parents are able to support their child not only financially but also by being physically there. This includes cheering them on during a school sport or being home to provide them company. The lack of interest of a parent on their child’s involvement makes the child feel that their parent doesn’t really care because they are too busy to even be their when receiving such achievements. Parents are one of the main support systems of a child. Being a part of your child’s life will be something they will carry on in the future and will also be a reason towards their success in life.

G. Citation

a. Karaim, Reed." Working Mothers Are Benefiting the Family." Web. 17 Feb. 2011.

b. Lowry, Richard." Working Mothers Are Harming the Family." Web. 17 Feb. 2011.

Articles:
Working Mothers Are Benefiting The Family
Setting a Good Example

Something else that matters is the example we set our children. And one important example is a willingness to work. There's no one who doesn't need to learn this sooner or later, and it's a lesson taught best by example.

If a mother is lucky enough to have a job she enjoys (and, while many of us like to complain about our work, the truth is that most people do like their jobs, at least a little), she provides her children a valuable window into some of the fulfillment possible in adult life.

A working mother can teach the value of independence, first through her own life, and second by expecting her children to take on more themselves. There is struggle in that, yes, but handled right, there can be pride and accomplishment.

I know this will upset some parents, but I think the children of working mothers can occasionally even enjoy a valuable sense of freedom. As a teenager, I remember visiting friends whose mothers seemed way too wrapped up in their high school lives. I found myself glad my own mother was too busy to worry about whether I had a chance of being elected prom king. (I didn't.)

A working mother, unless she happens to make her living as a swimsuit model, stands as a counterweight to a popular culture that still teaches us to value women more for how they fill out a sweater than a resume. This is obviously important to daughters, but often overlooked is how important it is to sons.

I look at my own mother, who raised seven children while working as a college teacher and librarian, and I think this is one of the great favors she did me. I saw her in charge. I saw her debating things with my father, also a teacher, as an equal, personally, professionally and financially. I marched off into adult life thinking this was the way things were, and I and the succession of female bosses I've had all had our lives made easier.

Working Mothers Are Harming The Family

Where Does Guilt Come From?

Work has, in post-feminist America, become central to the identity of women (and child-rearing doesn't count). Work is an act of historical redemption for all those centuries of oppression and sexism, so that sounding at all skeptical about it is to be identified with those former forces of darkness. When negative day care studies appear, there's a palpable worry, not that the children are endangered, but that women's careers are. Time.com ran a piece dismissing the NICHD study "in an effort to keep half of America's workforce from running screaming from their offices." Author Susan Chira captured the work-as-redemption sentiment perfectly in her A Mother's Place: Choosing Work and Family Without Guilt or Blame, as she described the release that came with leaving her newborn at home: "When I returned to work [full time], I left behind a gnawing sense of oppression, boredom, and guilt that had cast a pall over my maternity leave" (her maternity leave had been six months long; she took an 18-month leave to write her book).

As the subtitle of Chira's book suggests, avoiding guilt and bad feelings is an obsession for working moms. But where does this guilt come from? Is there one television show, for example, that portrays working mothers in anything but a heroic light? No, this guilt must be something working mothers conjure themselves, some tickle in the back of their brains saying that they shouldn't be abandoning their children for much of the day. (For a snapshot of the sheer physical alienation that leaving a young child at home entails, consider this passage from Brian Robertson's There's No Place Like Work: "Almost three hundred American employers, including Aetna, Eastman Kodak, Cigna, and Home Depot, now offer 'lactation support rooms' where female employees can take regular breaks to attach electric pumps to their breasts in order to collect the milk in bottles for their infants in day care. Some companies, aside from the 'pumping rooms,' have 'lactation consultants' to help mothers solve breast-feeding problems.")

The media are wary of reporting negative day care results partly out of a fear of offending working mothers, but partly also out of tribal loyalty: Many of the reporters are themselves working moms (including Chira, who reported on day care for the New York Times while experiencing its joys). This produces reliably biased reporting. David Murray of the Statistical Assessment Service has written about a characteristic episode. A study in the New England Journal of Medicine found that kids who attended day care in their first six months were less likely to have asthma at age 13. The theory was that by being exposed to so many germs and infections so early, the kids developed resistance. The Boston Globe, the New York Times, and the Washington Post trumpeted the study. The New England Journal editorialized: "For those of us who share the furtive guilt of having left marginally ill toddlers at day care, these findings ... offer a sense of relief."...