Intellectualism for All

1429 Words6 Pages
Nicole Kenney English Composition II Final Draft 3.8.15 Intellectualism For All Katie Pearson is constantly ridiculed for her obsession with dance. As a twelve-year-old girl, she should be focusing on school work rather than wasting her time studying and practicing dance. Katie’s teachers warn her parents that this obsession is hindering her academic performance. As the years pass, Katie’s parents become increasingly worried that she will not be able to attend college due to her poor grades. Does Katie have to give up her only passion to do well in school? Will this hinderance follow her into college? The choice is not Katie’s to make. Instead, her school makes the decision of whether Katie’s dance-craze will destroy or bolster her chance at intellectualism. In the essay “Hidden Intellectualism,” author Gerald Graff stresses that schools and colleges are missing opportunities by not channeling students’ street smarts into good academic work. Graff first proposes that schools miss these opportunities by overlooking the intellectual potential of street smarts. He goes on to say that intellectual writing is only necessary for students who wish to become intellectuals themselves. Graff uses himself as an example of a student uninterested in the intellectual world of academia; as an adolescent, he preferred sports. His neighborhood at the time had a boundary between social classes. This divide tore Graff. He needed to prove his intelligence in a way that would not subject him to a beating from his neighbors. Upon pursuing his passion for sports, Graff’s adolescent self realized that he was unknowingly practicing intellectualism. His interest in sports prepared him with the rudiments of intellect. In other words, sports was more exciting to his younger self because it was more intellectual than his academic studies. Next, Graff describes the parallel between the

More about Intellectualism for All

Open Document