name: Essay Samples

The Front Porch

The Front Porch is an article by Chester McCovey that takes a candid observation of the changes within the contemporary society based on the diminishing relevance of the front porch in many homes. The author begins by citing that the front porch in the earlier decades was a mandatory fixture in many American homes. His grandparents, he reckons, had a front porch where they used to bask and socialize with passersby. This trend, however, is dying due to the emerging garages that are ultimately replacing porches in many homes. This shift from the porch to the garage represents a continuous social change in the contemporary American society.
Using his house, the author portrays a generational disparity between his grandparents’ generation and his. The front porch, in this instance, succumbed to change due to electricity and automobiles. The current generation does not seek the natural summer breeze as the air conditioning, thanks to electricity, achieves that. The sitting at the front porch has made way for sitting in the traffic due to heavy usage of automobiles. The outdoors as extended by the front porch are no longer attractive as the indoors that are laden with television, internet and radio.
The current generation, however, prefers the backyard patio deck as an outdoor facility in their homes. The backyard patio does not in any way replace the front porch according to the author. It only validates the point that the contemporary society is anti-communal. The backyard only acts as a platform for individuals to escape from the outside world and the rest of the community which the front porch used to allow one to embrace. The anti-communal behavior has further been heightened by the media particularly the social media. Many families rarely interact physically but only on the digital platform via twitter, Facebook, MySpace et cetera. The author allows us as readers to assess our societies and accept the role that the outdoors affords us. The porch, the breeze and the physical interaction with the community is all that this generation needs to be once more human and social human beings for that matter.