The dirty Canary

Gustavo Quintero
English 48A
December 14, 2007
JOurnal #32

Quote:
"A dirty canary chirps desperatly in a cage beside me. Its dream of green fields and sunshine is a very old dream-almost worn out, I think"(Davis 2599).

Summary:
Davis is describing the conditions under which the the people of the industrial city live in.

Response:
I want to comment on what I think is the large importance of the dirty canary in, "Life in the Iron Mills". I do not want to make it sound like I am trying to stretch out a lot from a little but I think that the dirty canary spaeks volumes for the people who work in the iron mills. The dirty canary is a symbol for the opression that these people live under. My mom used to have a pair of canary and no matter what the weather they always sang. They would sing the most beautiful songs all day long. Untill the night came at which they would fall asleep. Even though they were kept in a little cage all day long they kept singing. Thus the canary symbolizes the inner hope that the workers have. They work all day long under horrible condintions hoping that they will come out on top. To me the dirt on the canary's feather's evokes a felling of sadness. To see such a beautiful and innocent thing be marred by the soot from the city is a travesty. Likewise the jobs that the immigrant workers are given in teh still mills is also a stragety. This almost parallels the working conditions that the asian workers face in the sweatshops or the miners that mine blood diamonds. If you think closely about the dirty canary you can how it has a much more global symbolization of opression.