ipl-logo

What Does It Mean To Be Educated

574 Words3 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Narrative of Frederick douglass

Education can contain many different components and can come in many different forms. Some people may think because they know a lot about particular subject, they are the smartest or most educated person around. Others may think they are not educated, based on a lack of knowledge in a particular subject area. Someone who knows a little about everything may believe they are more educated than someone who knows a lot about only a few subjects. Some people think that just because they attend school, they are educated. Education is intangible and difficult to measure which in turn leads to many different opinions of who is or is not considered educated.
I believe the most educated person is someone who has obtained the most knowledge and subsequently developed the needed skills to apply that …show more content…

For example, Frederick Douglass played an essential role in the termination of slavery; he was a man who was not educated in a traditional setting. He was not able to go to school to get an education, so his master’s wife helped him to achieve this. When she stopped helping him learn, Douglass would find anyone or anything that would help him gain knowledge. He would have to go to the store, and on the way home he would stop by and visit poor white boys who went to school so that they could teach him to read. Douglass, in return, paid them with bread for their services. Today, many people take education for granted and thus, do not work hard in school and strive to the best that they can in school. Douglass went on to be one of the greatest writers and public speakers in history because he was very motivated to educate himself which, in turn, granted him freedom from slavery. He once had a vision of a slave who was able to read and write. His determination to gain knowledge, therefore, resulted in his great aid of the abolishment of slavery (Douglass

Show More
Related
199 Words | 1 Pages

If education is not teaching you how to use the knowledge, the diploma would be the most useless stuff in the world. While, the common sense of people still tend to believe education means smart, vice versa. “You got college degree, you, you must be smart!” that’s many people may say to a college graduate several decades ago. However, are the graduates really as smart as people believe?

Read More
776 Words | 4 Pages

Mike Rose disagrees with the assumption that “Intelligence is closely associated with formal education” (Mike, 247). Formal education does not always measure the level of intelligence of a person. Education as something people can gain not only in school, but every day of their lives. We should be learning from our experiences, and apply this knowledge to our everyday lives. Wisdom should not be looked at as just

Read More
486 Words | 2 Pages

Douglass for example emphasized the importance of education for slaves. Douglass is a first had observer of the strategy of slave owners to keep their slaves ignorant. By keeping slave uneducated they are unable to express the horrible things that happen to them to the world. Hugh Auld forces his wife to stop teaching Douglass to read (auld stopping teaching quote) , so Douglass teaches himself. For him learning to read was a major turning point in his quest for freedom and it enabled him to put out his book, which would inspire many to turn against slavery.

Read More
957 Words | 4 Pages

By using strong textual evidence from multiple sources, there is an argument that can be proven. The power of education in “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass" is one of the most important themes in the entire work, but it is not a theme with a consistent meaning. Although Frederick Douglass understands that the only path to freedom, both for himself and fellow slaves, is through learning to read, write, and have an educational base to build on, he is at the same time disgusted with education because it causes him to understand the full extent of the horrors of slavery. At one point, Douglass states, “It [education] opened my eyes to the horrible pit, but offered no ladder upon which to get out." With this important quote, having examined the meaning and importance of education in “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass.

Read More
582 Words | 3 Pages

In the narrative Why I Learned to Read and Write, by Frederick Douglass he expressed how difficult life had been being a slave. He felt the need to break away from the norm and learn how to read and write. While educating himself he dealt with many obstacles that prolonged his education. Although he dealt with difficult obstacles he ended up becoming a free slave, because he was well educated. Slaveholder believed education and slavery were incompatible, therefore Douglass was faced with the decision to use various stratagems; in the process he ended up re-enforcing the view of the slaveholders and taught society the importance of education.

Read More
582 Words | 3 Pages

Frederick Douglass in his narrative “Why I learned to Read and Write” demonstrates how he surpassed many obstacles along the way towards getting an education. These obstacles not only shaped Frederick’s outlook on life but also influenced him in his learning to read and write. Frederick’s main challenge was that of not being an owner of his person but rather a slave and a property to someone else. Frederick Douglass lived in the time when slavery was still taking place and slaveholders viewed slavery and education as incompatible. The slave system didn’t allow mental or physical freedom for slaves; slaveholders were to keep the apt appearance and slaves were to remain ignorant.

Read More
1238 Words | 5 Pages

Intellectualism is the factor of being intellect or intelligent. The idea of what it means to be educated can be interpreted many different ways by different people. Some think it’s having a 4.0 and going to Harvard, while others believe in the idea of having common sense. In the essay, “Hidden Intellectualism,” Gerald Graff reflects how lack of education is viewed negatively in society. On top of that, a question also lies what it means to educated.

Read More
560 Words | 3 Pages

Douglass states: “The more I read, the more I was led to abhor and detest my enslavers. I could regard them in no other light than a band of successful robbers, who had left their homes, and gone to Africa, and stolen us from our homes, and in a strange land reduced us to slavery” (Douglass 51). Reading and writing opened Frederick Douglass’s eyes to the cause of the abolitionist. He became knowledgeable about a topic that white slave owners tried to keep hidden from their slaves. Literacy would eventually impact his life in more ways than what he could see while he was a young slave under Master Hugh’s

Read More
973 Words | 4 Pages

Because of this, he successfully creates a contrast between what the slave owners think of and treat the slaves and how they are. Douglass says that slave’s minds were “starved by their cruel masters”(Douglass, 48) and that “they had been shut up in mental darkness” (Douglass, 48) and through education, something that they were deprived of, Frederick Douglass is able to open their minds and allow them to flourish into the complex people that they are. By showing a willingness to learn to read and write, the slaves prove that they were much more than what was forced upon them by their masters.

Read More
1727 Words | 7 Pages

He became known as an inspirational person. Not many people are willing to go against what others believe, but Douglass was. His slave owner thought that it was “unlawful, as well as unsafe, to teach a slave to read” (Douglass 29), but that did not stop him from pursuing further knowledge. Education has a powerful effect that makes others fear that one has superiority over them one way or another. Slaves had their basic human rights taken away from them because slave owners wanted them to lack the ability to form an opinion on what was happening to them.

Read More
836 Words | 4 Pages

Furthermore, Education opened Douglass’s eyes to the reality of his injustice as a slave; thus, compelling him to action as he recalls, “In moments of agony, I envied my fellow-slaves for their stupidity. ”(Douglass, 2014, p.133) Education caused Douglass heartache. While attaining his education benefited Douglass, he could not relate to his fellow slaves. The fellow slaves had the ability to remain content with their current state of being since it was all they had ever known. Douglass knew otherwise and longed for the forbidden life as a free man, as it changed from an unattainable idea into an achievable

Read More
850 Words | 4 Pages

Education gives hope for Douglass’s life since he began to truly understand what goes on in slavery. As he figured out more about the topic, his self- motivation poured out hope in his life. As Frederick saw an opportunity to become free, he worked hard to accomplish it. Masters and slaveholders believe teaching slaves is wrong, but with Douglass’s

Read More
1673 Words | 7 Pages

Douglass is always curious and he never gives up even when he finds several obstacles in his way, because he perfectly knows what his goal is: he needs an education to get his freedom. He is determined to get it even though it requires a lot of hard work. Douglass is sure of the potential of education. As a matter of fact he knows well that knowlegde can change his life while leading him to freedom. Douglass has both the motivation and the determination because he is aware that owing to education he can get to great places in his life, and that education makes the world a better place

Read More
539 Words | 3 Pages

In class we have gone over certain pieces of literature of vast cultural meaning for a person, such as Homer's works, and the question is, do I think that there is any work of literature that has that same meaning for society today? No, I do not think that there is any work of literature that has the same meaning. When one thinks of "Homer", one automatically refers to the author of the earliest epic poems such as, Trojan War, Iliad and The Odyssey, which almost every pupil has learned or read one if not all three of these stories. As a child I learned about Homer in Middle School and it continued all the way up to College. As a high school student we would have to memorize parts of these poems and then recite them to the class.

Read More
400 Words | 2 Pages

Knowledge is a very important essential of life because it help us understand and learn through our experience and education by discovering new things. Reading and writing help Frederick Douglass to form and articulate his ideas about slavery by discovering the true meaning behind the word “abolitionist,” which led him the to find freedom. Moving to Baltimore helped Douglass find opportunities at a young age. He realized how important reading was when his masters got upset when he was learning how to read, which gave him the need to learn in order to find out the true freedom behind life. Learning how to read was important to Douglass life because he started to figure out how to read newspapers and books when he was left alone.

Read More

More about What Does It Mean To Be Educated

Related Topics

Open Document