Mike Rose and Gerald Graff: School Vs. Self

In Gerald Graff’s writing, “Hidden Intellectualism,” he contrasts street smart and book smart. Graff claims that some believe it is a waste to be street smart because they can not apply that intelligence to academic work. What does not seem to arise, is that schools and higher education schools may be responsible for neglecting the potential to incorporate street smarts into curriculum. Graff believes the reason that educators oversee the opportunity of street smarts is due to the fact that street smarts is occasionally associated with unintellectual concern. Graff himself did not enjoy the constant studying, reading challenging texts or Orwell. The only books he cared for was sport magazines. He thought himself to be the “typical teenage anti-intellectual” or so he believed. Graff realized that intellectualism and anti-intellectualism can not be associated with whether a person is interested in plato versus cars. He also realized that even though he enjoyed sports more he was still engaging himself. He would analyze different teams and their plays and gain intellectual skills by doing this and even taking part in similar activities. Overall, Gerald Graff believes you do not need to be book smart to be an intellectual individual. Although he does not believe book work should be rid of completely, he just believes that street smart topics should be incorporated to have a balance so all students will enjoy what they are learning. This does not necessarily mean all students will now get straight A’s or apply themselves., but I do believe students will do better. If a student is writing about something that interests them they might not put it off or ignore it, they may attempt to do it.

In “Blue-Collar Brilliance,” written by Mike Rose, Mike states how blue collar workers are looked down upon and are deemed to be unintelligent compared to white collar workers. Rose compares this theory to his mother. His mother was a waitress, a blue