Moral Message Of Satire Essay

Name: Weitao Li

Instructor: Julie Flynn

Course:301: College Writing and Research

Date:9/15/2015

The Role of the Audience in Conveying the Moral Message of the Satire

Satire has been extensively used in order to convey powerful moral messages concerning social flaws, behaviors, attitudes and worldviews. The purpose of satire is to ridicule the social problems in order to cause a change of the society. Particular, Both authors of these two articles hope to help the audience to think about the issue, analyze it, and understand its implications, as they are put forth by the author. The strategies and means of creating satire differ to other kinds of literature. And it has to apply current issues. It went beyond the traditional media, and became televised or even broadcasted online. Satire is a complex type of literature that can impact audiences profoundly and cause them to analyze the subject matter critically, and consequently prompt them to

This is also shown in Gray, Jones and Thompson, who argue that, “In order for a joke to have an impact, it must play with the commonly agreed upon social norms (Gray, Jones and Thompson 9). For example, in Swift’s famous “A Modest Proposal”, the piece would convey no moral message to a cannibal from the jungle. This is because, first, they do not share the same social space and reality with the author, and therefore, they would not have the background knowledge to understand the argument and second, they have different values and moral principles, and also they would not be horrified at the idea of eating Irish children, but on the contrary, they would take the piece seriously. Such an audience would therefore not accomplish their role as the author’s partners in the process of criticizing the social