Analysis Of Catherine Deveny's Essay

Reduce Greed! All the problems will be solved, Retail Therapy. This is the attitude that author Catherine Deveny, was addressing in her article “Spend, spend, spend. Its no way to happiness” Deveny employs conventions such as repetition, metaphors, rhetorical questions and personal anecdotes to persuade the reader that consumerism is destructive to our lives.

To convey the dangers of consumerism to her audience, Deveny employs repetition and metaphor throughout the text. Repetition is used in the title of the text itself telling readers to ‘spend, spend, spend’, which implies instant gratification, the emphasis on the ‘spend’ shows the pressure and time restraints that could be seen in the consumers eye. Later on in the first paragraph the author uses the “nothing new,

nothing fancy, nothing even slightly original” the repetition of the word ‘nothing’ shows childish behavior with ungrateful and spoilt attitudes that consumers have. Further on in the text the author utilizes the convention repetition when saying “I want it and I want it NOW… NOW” this shows that not only are consumers spoilt and childish but they are impatient and rude as well. The use of “Mortgagee Mountain, between Default District and Foreclosure Falls” Is a strong emphasis that consumers are going to far with the extent that they will go to buy happiness. Metaphor is applied in the text to emphasis the stupidity behind consumerism and the damage it is doing, “Just stop trying to fill that gaping hole inside yourself with more stuff” this implies that consumers are just buying things because they think it will make them feel better but ‘Money cant buy happiness!!’ Later on in the text Deveny writes “Turn off that desire button inside you, not just put it on snooze” Suggests that consumers are struggling to stop themselves from buying things saying that they can push it away for a short while but in the end they will crack. Money cant buy happiness no matter what consumers think this will always stay true and the more consumers believe that they can will only create bigger problems. With the use of repetition and metaphors Deveny has given a valid and backed up opinion on why consumerism is consuming the human population.

To convey the huge scale of destructiveness that consumerism is causing, Deveny employs rhetorical question and personal anecdotes.

Rhetorical questions are exploited throughout the text to engage the reader to think about the key points that the author is explain, “How would it soothe those wounds of feeling unloved, unappreciated and unhappy? How you had to have it”. Deveny is asking the reader how spending money and buying unnecessary things is going to make you feel better or happier. “Does anyone else want to slap half the people around you and say…” this shows the impact that something that may seem small can have on daily lives. Personal anecdotes are put to use in the text in order to give a personal effect to the reader something that they can relate to the author with, “Someone handed me $300...” “10 times as much sitting in my bank account.” “Because I could see it, feel it, smell it.” These examples connect with the reader more they are only creating a bigger problem because greed is destructive not productive. By employing the conventions rhetorical questions and personal anecdote the author has provided evidence and strong reasoning behind why consumerism is destructive to our

lives.

As shown throughout the text Deveny employs the use of rhetorical questions, personal anecdotes, metaphors and repetition to give her opinion on the problem of consumerism. The idea that money buy happiness and that greed only destroys shows the destructive power the consumerism has, through strong reasoning, valid arguments and high quality evidence the author was able to give the reader a good understand on the problems with retail therapy. In reading this text I believe that this is a serious issue for consumers and that Deveny gives strong and honest evidence towards the issue.