Blue Collar Brilliance Sum

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Within Mike Rose’s essay Blue Collar Brilliance, he argues about the intellectual resources of individuals that have occupations associated with service or physical labor and how our culture has narrow-minded judgments on these sorts of employments they label as “blue-collar”. He proclaims that pertaining to a certain social class has nothing to do with one’s intelligence and that experience is the basic strategy to knowledge not necessarily a formal education. Coming from a household with blue-collar workers that didn’t have the opportunity for a formal education but still know the importance and value of it, I'm of two minds in regards to Mike Rose's claim in regards to blue-collar workers. On one hand, I agree that blue-collar workers have many capabilities and specialties. On the other hand, getting a formal education can never hurt anybody and it can open up many doors for a more a professional distinctive career. In his essay, Rose incorporates two stories concerning two different family members that fall into these types of jobs. One is his mother Rosie, who was a waitress and the other is his uncle Joe who worked in the paint-and-body department. Rose visited both his relatives at their place of work and observed their every move attentively. In both stories, he explains how both body and mind are used to accomplish numerous tasks effectively. He argues about the hidden area of learning that blue-collar workers have to go through such as multi-tasking, memorization and problem solving. Though I concede that experience is a key factor when trying to learn something new, I insist that a formal education is important. I believe Rose missed a great point when considering which side to take in his essay, sure the jobs he mentioned require some mind activity but I see it as taking the easy way out and not going to school. I mean who wouldn’t have to have a

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