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America Needs Its Nerds Summary

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America Needs Its Nerds, written by Leonid Fridman, expresses the country’s need for studious people. The United States look down on kids that would rather learn than play sports. Leonid argues that this anti-intellectualism idea is not good for the greater community. Without intellectuals the U.S. will not be as great as countries that value academics. Leonid Fridman uses motifs, hyperboles, and criticizing questions to support his argument on how nerds and geeks are essential to society. Leonid Fridman starts out by using the hyperbole, ostracized, to initiate his argument. “Nerds are ostracized while athletes are idolized” (line 18). Intellectuals are not truly expelled from society, nevertheless they held to a lower standard. Meanwhile, …show more content…

“In most industrialized nations, not least of all our economic rivals in East Asia, a kid who studies hard is lauded and held up as an example to other students” (line 37-40). Every other successful country values intellectual people. Instead of being outcasted they are praised. “How can a country where typical parents are ashamed…. Of their son reading Weber…… be expected to compete in the technology race with Japan or remain a leading political and cultural force in Europe?” (line 47-52). America does not value academics like other countries, therefore their advancements would be better. There is no way to compete with countries that care about their academics. “How long can America remain a world-class power if we constantly emphasize socials skills and physical prowess over academic achievement and intellectual ability?” (line 53-56). There is bound to be the decline of power for the U.S. Fridman is asking these critical rhetorical questions to bring up the problem with outcasting nerds. They are the ones that keeps America a world power and without them our rival can over power us. This rhetorical question is forcing the reader to think about how serious the problem is and by society valuing physical fitness over academia it is keeping the country from

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380 Words | 2 Pages

Well known article writer, Leonid Fridman, in his article, “America Needs Its Nerds”, describes the truthful idea that nerds and geeks, in our society, are ostracized while the kids who play sports and party are prominent. Fridman’s purpose is to impress upon the readers that nerds should not have to conform to society’s unimpressive values of what it means to be “popular”. He adopts an indignant tone in order to convey to his readers that the idea of nerds and geeks needs to fought. Fridman moves to the idea that children who would rather read and build model airplanes are the social outcasts compared to the ones who would rather play football and get wasted at parties.

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For instance, he claims, “according to the Webster's New World Dictionary,” a geek “is a street performer who shocks the public by biting off heads off live chickens” (lines 5-8). Clearly, Fridman chooses to begin his argument with a shocking fact in order to establish an indisputable basis for his argument. Moreover, he maintains that students “ostracized for their intelligence” “are deprived of a chance to learn adequate social skills and acquire good communication tools” (line 23-27). Here, Fridman explains through a cause and effect relationship that students who pursue knowledge are excluded and therefore put at a disadvantage in personal interaction. By demonstrating his point in a cause-and-effect relationship, Fridman appeals to the reasoning skills of his reader.

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493 Words | 2 Pages

Leonid Fridman characterizes the typical American mindset this makes the text easily understood and relatable for the readers. Because the problem at hand is mainly geared toward Americans he brings up the fact that, “In most industrialized nations, not least of all of our economic rivals in East Asia, a kid who studies hard is lauded and held up as an example to other students.” He is showing the reader that in other countries they praise the children for their academic efforts unlike the US that use derogatory language like “nerd” and “geek” when referring to the academically achieving people. He also compares the jobs of individuals from other countries to show the divide between the American mindset and the mindset around the world. Fridman states “In many parts of the world university professorships are the most prestigious and materially rewarding positions but not in America…” Friedman says this so the readers are aware of the rift between America and other countries of the world especially their view of intellectual

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973 Words | 4 Pages

The Rhetorical Analysis of the “America Needs its Nerds” The mental capacity is treated as a disadvantage in the America, despite the fact it already helped the country many times. This long-term problem became the main topic of the Leonid Fridman’s essay “America Needs its Nerds”. The work first appeared on January 11, 1990 in the New York Times as a part of the series “Voices of the New Generation”. The author spoke about the negative attitude the American society has to smart people and demonstrates it with the usage of words like “nerd” or “geek”.

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