A Review Of Gerald Graff's Hidden Intellectualism

School has been around for many years now. Countless of people every year attend this place in order to gain knowledge and grow as a person. The education an institution provides can vary from literature, philosophy, language, and so on. Willona M. Sloan has done research upon the purpose of education and found that it has to do with “[supporting] children 's ability to become lifelong learners who are able to love, work, and act as responsible members of the community” (pg 9). Although education serves a role in a person’s life, is the material provided to educate these students sufficient though? Gerald Graff argues in his article, Hidden Intellectualism, that if school systems would incorporate more youth culture into the lessons, students

Despite the fact that those readings do give them the wisdom upon things they would never think of, it doesn’t interest them enough to think deeply about. Topics such as sports, fashion, will attract the young minds because “they satisfy an intellectual thirst more thoroughly than school culture, which is pale and unreal” (Graff 248). Talking about something a person has a strong passion about will help them create better arguments which is a skill. However, how is that possible if schools find it better to focus on subjects that interest them rather interest the students who are learning it (Graff 245). To do something like that is pointless because time and resource is being wasted on a group of people who have no fascination with what is being taught. If no one is paying attention, there is no way a person can be educated. What is being provided should result in mastery in that subject, not zone out the audience

Just like Graff said, he didn’t believe he was becoming intellectual, but what he was doing on a daily basis was preparing him to be a scholarly student. Due to the “reading and arguing about sports and toughness” he eventually grew to “propose a generalization, restate, and response to a counterargument, and perform other intellectualizing operations” (Graff 248). By Graff having something he passionately enjoyed made it easier to strengthen these “clever skills” he was using without noticing it himself. Students have things they have strong opinions about. That leads to defining their point, viewing both sides, and thinking wisely to make their points stronger; all what a literature class looks for. What teachers can do is use these sources to help expand the scholars’ talents to a much higher level that can later tackle on difficult