Proposal

For my research hypertext I am choosing to focus on the horrible, desensitizing conditions and experiences of those individuals working in the fast food industry. Although I personally have not worked in the fast food industry, one of my very good friends has so I plan to use her first-hand experience to portray this occupation from a youth’s standpoint. However, I would also like to do some research on adults depending on this occupation to stay out of debt. Throughout my hypertext I would like to include some of the reasons why men and women are forced into low-wage jobs such as this one including: providing for family, paying for their education or their child’s education, or even just trying to provide for themselves.

Throughout my readings in class thus far I have been inspired by the various conceptual tools used by Barbara Ehrenreich, Eric Schlosser, and David K. Shipler. One of the tools I found most effective throughout Ehrenreich’s “Nickel and Dimed” is the fact that she actually set out to live a low-wage life in order to truly report on what she experiences and witnesses throughout her experience. Although I do not plan on actually living out a low wage job in order to accomplish this hypertext I do think I can draw upon her ethos to make my own work more effective. One of her most striking quotes that truly gives a first-hand account of the desensitization of workers is, “From the first day on, I find that of all the things that I have left behind, such as home and identity, what I miss most is competence” (Ehrenreich 17). I also plan to gather data from a variety of fast food chains as well as regions throughout the United States in order to gather similarities and differences among the spectrum of the fast food industry.

Throughout Schlosser’s “Fast Food Nation”, he uses vivid imagery such as, “they grab the meat with their hooks and attack it fiercely with their knives. As they hack away, using all their strength-grunting, the place suddenly feels different, primordial”, to convey to readers the grotesque, perhaps inhumane, nature of working in the slaughterhouse. (Schlosser 170). While my hypertext does not focus on working in the slaughterhouse, I plan to use vivid imagery throughout my hypertext to enrich the content. I could also broaden my research to include not only working for the fast food industry but also visiting the slaughterhouse and the desensitizing effects that come with witnessing ruthless slaughter. I also plan to play off of Shipler’s idea of the “American myth vs. the American dream” presented throughout the work in order to analyze the reasons why so many individuals feel the need to work in the fast food industry in order to build from the bottom up. My goal throughout this hypertext is to effectively present the realities of working in the fast food industry and convey true testimonials of the trials and tribulations of the fast food worker.