https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=pYyUWn224AE
The audience in Lou Gehrig’s speech is his fans and anybody who has been affected by ALS. The purpose of the speech was to motivate the audience by showing everybody how strong willed and fearless an individual can be even when facing adversity. He is convincing them that even when something bad happens in your life, you need to be positive and grateful for the opportunities you were granted and what you still have to live for.
Gerald Graff writes a persuasive essay in which he explains the differences between book smarts and street smarts. The essence of Graff’s argument is that most of the time, book smarts can come in more than one form and be hidden behind peoples street smarts, hence the title “Hidden Intellectualism”. In Graff’s point of view, schools are at fault for not embracing students “anti-intellectual” interests. He finds it disappointing how students are intelligent about so many things in life but fail to apply it to academic work. He believes that students will more quickly and efficiently reach their intellectual potential if they were granted the opportunity to engage with more topics that interest them, since intellectualism can be portrayed on a very wide spectrum. Graff also mentions that sometimes people, including himself are afraid to show their true intellectual selves due to labels and bullying. To avoid this situation however, talking about a sports topic was a safe way to unleash hidden intellectualism. If people can argue about topics like sports, music, and politics, then they certainly have potential to make strong arguments and analyzations within pieces of literature. Graff feels that the sooner we help people recognize their hidden intellectualism, the more successful the world will be.
I undoubtedly agree with the points that Graff constructs in his argument. Graff makes a personal connection with the reader by explaining how he discovered his intellectual gift through his power to argue and reason with topics that he felt strongly about. Graff states, “In short, I was your typical anti-intellectual- or so I believed for a long time. I have recently come to think, however, that my preference for sports over schoolwork was not anti-intellectualism so much as intellectualism by other means (Graff 245-246 ). Here, he successfully explains to the reader that intellectualism comes in different forms, and that most peoples are hidden behind topics of their interest. Graff is surely right about his claim that people hold back their true intellectualism to protect their image. He discusses how when he lived in his Chicago neighborhood, he was stuck between the desire to prove his book smarts and the fear of proving them too much. Graff mentions, “I grew up torn then, between the need not to jeopardize my respectable future and the need to impress the hoods (Graff 246). This proves that even though most people are highly intellectual, they either don’t recognize it or choose not to show it.
A final point that Graff makes is that schools are at fault for not allowing students to express their “anti-intellectual” side. He believes that it’s wrong for one to think that street smarts aren’t good enough for someone who can’t see their interests through “academic eyes”. Although I concede and understand that some do not recognize any parallels between book smarts and street smarts, I still insist that schools are failing to make an effort to bring out the intellectual side in students by focusing on their interests. Graff recognizes this opposing side by stating, “Making students’ non academic interests an object of academic study is useful, then, for getting students’ attention and overcoming their boredom and alienation, but this tactic won’t in itself necessarily move them closer to an academically rigorous treatment of those interests” (Graff 250). However, he then floats back to his argument on why schools are at fault for not granting students the opportunity to prove their intellectual potential through personal interests. He claims, “Schools and colleges are missing an opportunity when they do not encourage students to take their non academic interests as objects of academic study. It is self defeating to decline to introduce any text or subject that figures to engage students who will otherwise tune out academic work entirely” (Graff 250). Here, he emphasizes the fact that applying academic tactics to topics that are interesting to students will help strengthen their ability to apply these academic tactics to pieces of literature such as Shakespeare if they were just given the chance to.
As a college student, I can agree that it is much harder to read and write about academic topics rather than those of my interests, which is why I can relate to Graff’s argument. There are so many people I am acquainted with that are extremely intelligent, yet their GPA or SAT scores don’t show it. Ask me to write a 20 page paper on Hamlet and I’d say its too much; ask me to write a 20 page paper about soccer and I’d say its too little.
Gerald Graff is arguing that schools are at fault for not embracing students “anti-intellectual” interests. He believes that students will more quickly and efficiently reach their intellectual potential if they were allowed to engage in topics that interest them, since intellectualism can be perceived in different ways.
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I’m 18 years old in my freshman year of college. This blog is for academic purposes. I hope you enjoy what I have to say about certain pieces of literature.
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