Rebeccah Rushing
Linsey Cuti
English 1623
15 April 2013
Is Corn Really the King?
“When a Crop Becomes King”[->0] is an eye-opening article for most people who are not big into reading ingredients of the food they put into their body. This article was written by Michael Pollan who is a leading writer on food culture. It was originally published in June 2002 in the New York Times. In this article, Michael Pollan argues that corn has become overused and overrated in North American society. It has become too cheap to sell and buy and has become used too much as a process of feeding livestock that we thrive on. Basically, Pollan is telling America that it is time to change what people eat and what people feed their animals. Corn, as Pollan describes, has been fed money from the government much so it can be overfed to the animals we eat every day that are harmed due to its lack of healthiness. He poses the argument that corn is destroying our environment’s health and our health also. Michael Pollan is a writer that is talk about by most after reading this small piece of literature. He chose something that is under the radar (corn being a bad thing) and wrote in the opposition. Most people would see corn as a great thing for diets and therefore write off this article. Pollan does a solid job of sticking to his ideas and making readers believe in what he is saying even though it’s a tough idea to get the concept of. Pollan breaks down corn in a way that will leave people pushing away from it and its harmfulness. When it comes to Pollan’s writing, he does it well, utilizing some essential rhetorical devices, his main two being an appeal using logos and an appeal using pathos. With that said his writing is not without flaws and does still leave some unanswered questions for the reader.
Pollan usage of the appeal logos is very strong throughout the whole article. As a writer Pollan uses logos which is “to construct an essay around facts and reason” to covey...