The Grayest Generation: A Rhetorical Analysis
For those who experience parenthood later in life, the chances of having a child with a developmental disorder is an all too real reality. In the Article "The Grayest Generation: Older parenthood won’t just redefine the American family. It will upend society too.”, Judith Shulevitz discusses how an increase in developmental disorders amongst children coincides with a growing trend of adults waiting to have children at an older age; while also addressing how these disorders could not only be caused by the age of the mother’s reproductive system, but also the father’s. Shulevitz uses the aforementioned points to build an argument for change in the penalties women face for reproducing. She uses writing
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strategies including exigence, ethos, pathos, and logos to bring her points to life and persuade the audience to want reform as well. Being published in The New Republic, the initial audience for this text is the subscribers and readers of The New Republic. According to the New Republic Wikipedia article, the publication is focused on commentary on politics and the arts. “Domestically, The New Republic as of 2011, supports a largely modern liberal stance on fiscal and social issues,” (The New Republic, 2015). While the audience is primarily a reader on the liberal side of the political spectrum, those who would be most interested in the text are parents of an older age and feminists interested in reform in the way motherhood is portrayed, as Shulevitz addresses content that coincides with these audiences. Judith Shulevitz uses the rhetorical strategy, exigency, to address the relevancy of the text. According to The Blugold Seminar in Critical Reading and Writing, exigence can be defined as an event or occurrence that prompts rhetorical discourse; a “problem”, gap, or “imperfection” that necessitates a response. The event that prompts rhetorical discourse in Shulevitz’ case is the recent discovery of her child’s fine-motor delay and need of occupational therapy. Judith and her husband were in the demographic of those who decided to embrace parenthood later in life and these events created a situation in which Shulevitz and her husband were invested in. In “The Grayest Generation”, Judith Shulevitz prefaces her article with her own history. After months of waiting and medical tests, around the age of thirty-seven she was able to conceive her son. Shulevitz explains how when her son was three, he was diagnosed with a fine motor delay. This experience allows her to ask the question “What if my son’s individual experience, meaningless from a statistical point of view, hinted at a collective problem?” (Shulevitz, 10). She dives into the discussion of fertility from there, expressing how age weakens not only the mother’s reproductive system but also the father’s reproductive system; and what type of problems can stem from these fertility issues. She then proceeds to discuss how the risk factors of having a child later in life are not only exclusive to a child’s biology, but also include physical factors such as early parental death. She brings her argument to a conclusion with a call to reform. “We’d have to stop thinking of work-life balance as a women’s problem, and reframe it as a basic human right,” (Shulevitz, 13). Shulevitz brings attention to the audience how many women are waiting until later in life to have children to avoid the repercussions of having children at a younger age; these repercussions include the possibility of missing out on a full education and/or not having enough financial stability to raise a child at a younger age. She then discusses steps taken by countries other than the United States, that implement help for child care, including Sweden’s egalitarian family policies, as a possible option to model reform after. Mrs.
Shulevitz uses various different strategies and sources throughout her article that appeal to ethos and strengthen her credibility among her audience. Firstly, she has situated ethos with her audience because she is an established writer, as well as editor, for The New Republic. Secondly, Shulevitz invents her ethos bringing attention to the fact that she herself is an older mother to a child with a birth defect. This first hand experience creates an air of credibility and good character for the audience. With her first hand experience, the audience draws a conclusion that she is writing this article to bring light to an experience she has had. Her credibility is further strengthened by her ethical appeals when she cites sources such as The Centers for Disease Control, the New England Journal of Medicine, psychiatrist Dolores Malaspina, Dr. Jay Gingrich, and Michael Davies. By citing these sources Shulevitz shows that she has done her homework on the subject, using expert opinions and statistics to support her …show more content…
claims. Enhancing her appeal to ethos, Shulevitz uses convincing appeals to logos, with numerous statistics and facts. These statistics and facts create a sense of reality and urgency for the audience, Shulevitz points out facts about the fertility of the mother: “The risk that a pregnancy will yield a trisomy rises from 2-3 percent hen a woman is in her twenties to 30 percent when a woman is in her forties.” She also addresses birth defects associated with the father: “For decades, neonatologists have known about birth defects linked to older fathers: dwarfism, Apert syndrome, Marfan Syndrome, and cleft palates.” (Shulevitz 10). These facts support the idea that the likelihood of a child born with a disorder is caused by the ageing of both parent’s reproductive systems. Shulevitz also discusses the fact that as parents reach older ages and fertility becomes a problem, the fertility industry is under-regulated and what happens to a child produced by fertility drugs is not reported on by the government (Shulevitz 11). She quotes the lead researcher and professor of pediatrics at he University of Adelaide in Australia, Michael Davies, when addressing that “there may be an excess of 500 preventable major birth defects occurring annually across Australia” as a direct result of some drugs used for fertility such as Clomid. These statistics and facts shape an appeal to logos and allow the audience to come to the conclusion that this problem is worth discussing. Shulevitz frames her statistics with sympathy inducing realties of older parents with the intent to build pathos.
She employs an appeal to pathos when she addresses the point that older parents will die earlier in their children’s live than a younger parent, “what haunts me is the actuarial risk I run of dying before my children are ready to face the world” (Shulevitz 12). With the added statistic presented in her argument that the loss of the mother at early age is connected to the decline in physical health of the mother’s child, this information evokes the emotion of sympathy among the audience; grasping at the audience’s imagination of not being able to help their own children. Judith Shulevitz also appeals to pathos when describing the process taken just to conceive a viable embryo. As Shulevitz describes being told by the doctor to wait a few months, her husband and her submitting to fertility tests, and having to inject herself with the drug Clomid five days a month, the audience is inquired to feel sympathetic. The audience is exposed to the arduous tasks faced by not only Mrs. Shulevitz family, but also many other families experiencing parenthood later in life. This shows one the complicated nature of the fertility
process. In the “The Grayest Generation”, Shulevitz is effective at convincing the audience that reform in the penalties women face for reproducing and raising children is essential through her use of the rhetorical writing devices: exigence, ethos, pathos, and logos. She effectively creates an intimate connection with the audience by sharing personal details about her struggles of having and raising a child at an older age, while also effectively portraying statistics and information presented by experts and people knowledgeable in fields such as fertility and pharmaceuticals. Work Cited "The New Republic." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, n.d. Web. 26 Oct. 2015. Shulevitz, Judith. "The Grayest Generation." The New Republic (2012): 9-12. Print. The Blugold Seminar in Critical Reading and Writing. 4th ed. University of Eau Claire. Pearson, n.d. Print.
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