A Modest Proposal

by Jonathan Swift

A Modest Proposal: Situational Irony 1 key example

Situational Irony
Explanation and Analysis—Women as Livestock:

While the primary targets of the Proposer's dehumanizing language are Irish children, the impoverished mothers of those children are treated with the same indignity. Throughout "A Modest Proposal," the Proposer refers to women as livestock, using the term "breeding" to describe human reproduction. This motif often coincides with the use of statistics:

The number of souls in this kingdom being usually reckoned one million and a half, of these I calculate there may be about 200,000 couple whose wives are breeders.