Flavo s Home By Gordon Parks
It keeps growing, spreading like cancer, human excrement clogged the sewer, a large
hole served as a toilet, the children ate with their fingers, desperate criminals hid in
the night, long lines waited at the sole water spigot, others waited at the only toilet in
the entire mountainside, throughout the place came wailing of hunger and hurt,
povertyis everything but a laughing matter. Photographer and writer, Gordon Parks,
in his essay, Flavio s Home reveals the struggles of families in poverty in Rio de
Janeiro, Brazil, highlighting a social political concern faced in many countries. Parks
essay, originally published in Voices in the Mirror during the 1990 s, adopts an
evocative tone in order to appeal to the incognizant rich to... Show more content on
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By appealing to the reader s emotions, Parks uses pathos to encourage the reader to
want to stop such tragedies from occurring. Parks is also credible, by being a well
known photographic essayist who has grown up knowing the struggle of poverty
and racism himself. Parks gains impact by mentioning in detail the way that Flavio s
family lives, and what a usual day consists of, for his family. Though he offers no
solutions, just the presentation of the struggles of one child, Parks emphasizes
specifically how the rich ignore the plight of these impoverished people, facing the
other direction by comparing the lifestyle in Parks hotel, and Flavio s home.
Evidently, Parks builds a strong interpretation of the rising population of poverty,
bringing a new perspective and meaning to the reader. The use of distinct details
lets the reader imagine exactly what wants to be visualized by Parks, describing
grimy walls that had large gaps, and floors, rotting under layers of grease and dirt
(Parks 2). Since Flavio s parents are away for most of the day, he is left with chores
to do until dark when he finally came back, his body sagging, ready to end the day
(Parks 2). Parks word choice creates immediacy, as if the reader were in Flavio s
shoes, constantly struggling to support a family. This lets readers obtain a greater
meaning of poverty, that can be reestablished and shared