Gerald Graff Beyond The Culture Wars Summary

In “Hidden Intellectualism,” Gerald Graff believes that individuals, who are ot interested in school, have a chance to be intellectual by inspiring them on subjects they themselves are interested in instead of forcing them to correspond with cliché historic figures. Graff begins his essay acknowledging the perception communities have on behavior of streetwise people who are looked at as “anti-intellects.” (264) Furthermore, he explains how society connects intelligence with historic heroes instead of modern subjects like sports or fashion; which Graff emphasizes is the issue. Graff supports his claim by providing a personal experience of growing up; he was that “anti-intellectual” (265) who preferred sports magazines and biographies rather

In “Hidden Intellectualism”, Gerald Graff argues that street smart kids can do better in school if teachers had gave them the opportunity to perform their intelligence on academic work. It will be helpful if school encouraged students to learn the subject they are interested in. Graff share his adolescent experience to support this argument. He was passionate about sport. Until entered college, he only read things about sports. This habit unwittingly developed his literacy, analyzing and debate skills. In the neighborhood he grew up, to maintain the class boundary between upper class and lower class, it was better to be book smart. However, he was struggle about whether to be intelligent or not. Because he wanted to be smart and impress the

We begin our education in kindergarten and spend 12 long years preparing ourselves for a life-changing 4 years, college. Those 12 years of preparation consisted of learning the alphabet, doing multiplication, reading Shakespeare, and many more subjects that most kids and teenagers hated and found unnecessary. We are learn different subjects, and we don’t also find much interest or liking to those subjects. In Gerald Graff’s essay, Hidden Intellectualism, he talks to us about what intellectualism is and how it isn’t only associated with subjects like mathematics or literature. He argues that students can channel their intellectual passion and will eventually be able to channel their work in school and do better. Graff himself writes “ If a

The deeper that one understands the reality of the intellectualism that many “street smart” people have they will preserve the importance of the individuals. This is vital for the public to understand that “Real intellectuals turn any subject, however lightweight it may seem, into grist for their mill through the thoughtful questions they bring to it, whereas a dullard will find a way to drain the interest out of the richest subject.” (Page 1) In “Hidden Intellectualism” Gerald Graff explains the overwhelming importance for the “street smart” people and the pretentious intellectuals. In Hidden Intellectualism, Gerald Graff starts with the age-old contention of the distinction between "school smarts" and "street smarts." Graff clarifies that by and large, these book smarts can take different structures and stow away in what individuals call road smarts, subsequently the "concealed" intellectualism. For him, he understood that he was mentally skilled when he saw that he was utilizing reason and factious techniques while talking about games with companions. Graff depicts that through his contending and thinking, he was demonstrating his scholarly side. He additionally gives the peruser another illustration of the revelation of shrouded intellectualism by telling the tale of Michael Warner, a man who likewise understood his scholarly side through his contending aside from rather than games, he was contending the Christian Pentecostal perspectives of his guardians.

I can see Graff’s viewpoint on this subject and I actually do agree with it in many ways. Graff recalls a time in his adolescent years when he absolutely abhorred reading. He talks about how the only reading he did back then was when he read his sports magazines and sports novels written for boys. Graff says, that at the time, he believed himself to be a sort of anti-intellectual because of his behavior towards the more classical approaches to learning. I know this is not a totally

With today’s education, teachers are enforcing much academic work on students to, hopefully, increase their intelligence. The goal of this academic work is to give the students that they will need for their life later. All schools have a group of students that have a lot of “street smarts,” but don’t do well in school. There is a common argument of if “street smarts” and academic work should be combined to better teach students. In Gerald Graff’s piece, Hidden Intellectualism, Graff talks about the academics that teachers enforce on students and “street smarts.” Graff claims that “schools and colleges might be at fault for missing the opportunity to tap into such street smarts and channel them into good academic work” (Graff 1).

Gerald Graff’s article, “Disliking Books” and Richard Rodriguez’s “Scholarship Boy” are similar and yet different in many ways. The two articles describe the journey of two boys from different backgrounds through various stages in their education.

In his essay “Hidden Intellectualism”, Gerald Graff makes a controversial claim regarding intellectualism itself. While we tend to think about intellectualism as being present in historically academic subjects, such as philosophy, the sciences, or poetry, Graff argues that everyday topics such as cars, sports, and fashion have the potential to be just as intellectual. He asserts that many schools have neglected to unlock this potential, and that they should harness it by incorporating seemingly unintellectual topics into school subjects. Graff advocates for the strategic use of traditionally street-smart topics into schools and colleges to encourage reflection and analysis in a similar way to academic topics.

Graff refers to his own adolescent experiences as, claiming that he too was a member of this supposedly anti-intellectual group. As a kid, he hated books and much rather read and studied sports magazines. He talks about his desires to fit in with the “hoods”, lower class “tough” kids

Graff then goes on to establish his ethos in the first few paragraphs while continuing to expand the thoughts and ideas on pathos throughout his essay. He begins to build his community and trust by recognizing his own credentials and sharing his personal background in writing. One of the first things noticed from the footnote about Gerald Graff’s professional career is that he has vast experience in the writing department. He is an English professor at a prestigious university, a past president of the Modern Language Association, and part of the professional association of scholars and teachers of English and other languages (198). But, since his background only assists his argument and does not define it, it is crucial to also look at his word choice, mood, language, and ideology in order to fully claim Graff a credible author.

In the essay, Disliking Books at an Early Age, Gerald Graff talks about his transition from being displeased and uninterested in literature, to having intellectual discussions about it and even teaching it. He did not begin to enjoy reading until he had discussions about the books that he read, which showed him a different perspective. Overall, his essay explains how readers can only enjoy literature if they turn it into a social activity by freely interpreting and discussing the pieces they have read.

John Ogbu’s oppositional culture theory explains racial differences in educational performance by looking at the societal structures of minorities. Ogbu uses case studies which he looks at the affluent neighborhoods that represent oppositional culture. There are several explanations as to academic disengagement among certain minorities. He also looks at white academic efforts and explanations of their own disengagement. According to James Ainsworth-Darnell and Douglas Downey, they state that, “Immigrant minorities tend to compare their condition to that of relatives in their homelands and because this comparison is usually favorable, they develop optimistic attitudes regarding both their chances for success in the new country and the payoff for efforts aimed at promoting achievement” (p. 536). However, involuntary minorities are in a “psychologically vulnerable position; their members did not migrate with an expectation to improve their condition, but were incorporated into society against their will” (p. 536). Ogbu pointed out that there are high achieving blacks that did not adopt the oppositional theory.

The issue being debated in the article “Hidden Intellectualism” by Gerald Graff is street smarts versus book smarts. Gerald Graff is an English professor at the University of Illinois and has written many books. The author claims that people are better off if they are more street smart than book smart. The authors is very persuasive using real life examples. I although disagree with this claim. I think that you need an equal mix of both street and book smarts.

“Hidden Intellectualism,” an excerpt from They Say/I Say: The Moves that Matter in Academic Writing by Gerald Graff, explains the importance of having diverse intellectualism and helping the kids with street smart intellectualism turn it into academic growth. The author’s claim in this excerpt is that school and colleges are missing out on an opportunity of helping the street smart kids grow their intelligence into good academic work. The significance in the author’s claim is that the students who believe they don’t have much of an opportunity in school or other things related to academics, realize they do.

One day the god Shiva teased his wife, the goddess Parvati, about her dark skin; he called her ‘Kali’ and said that her dark body against his white body was like a black snake coiled around a pale sandalwood tree. When she responded angrily, they began to argue and to hurl insults at one another. Furious, she went away to generate inner heat in order to obtain a fair, golden, skin.’