Challenging the student

The challenge in unleashing this hidden intellectualism that all students most likely have is not necessarily in getting them to read about what interests them. The part that teacher’s must learn to do is to convince these students to look at their topic of choice through the eyes of an intellectual. Most students are going to read about what strikes them as “cool.” What the teacher needs to do is challenge them to analyze what makes that cool. What parts of, let’s say baseball, interests that student the most. Challenge that student to form an argument for why baseball is America’s pastime and what makes their favorite player their favorite player. But not only challenge them to find what they like about the sport but also have them look at the other side as well. Similar to planting naysayers in this class, have the student find some negative things about the sport and have the student do their best to respond to these negative aspects with convincing arguments.

The start of my personal response

On a more personal level, I happen to agree with Graff’s sentiment. Granted I still don’t quite consider myself much of an intellectual, I do believe that I am slowly (and ever so surely) arriving at that heralded podium known as intellectualism. However my own laziness still tends to hold me back. I digress though. When I was growing up in my own small town, I too was presented with an interesting dichotomy; that being should I strive to be an exceptional student, or should I play the role of class jock/clown. This was really quite a struggle for a grade-schooler that carried into junior high. It was also a struggle that I may have not handled that well either.

In my defense, I quite effortlessly made above average grades. The problem though was not in necessarily making grades as much as the apparent work that went into it. If I made an A on a test then I would pose a rather cavalier attitude in regards to the matter, acting as if it was by mere good fortune that I came out with such a grade. To act like I had truly attempted at making that grade would have potentially been catastrophic to my reputation. 

Unlocking Intellect

In Gerald Graff’s essay “Hidden Intellectualism,” (2001) the age old problem of students having little to no desire to dive into academic topics is addressed.  However, Graff doesn’t see the problem to be the student’s desire, or lack thereof; so much as he does to see it as one of missed opportunity on behalf of the educator. Graff points out that there has never really been a connection between a given subject and the educational depth that a discussion can generate over said subject. There is no limit to subjects that can be intellectually inclined with a good question that is asked in regards to the topic, just the same there is also no limit to highly intellectually topics that can be drained out by irrelevance or lack of abstract thought. Graff offers his own experiences as an adolescent to strengthen his case.

 As a self-proclaimed “book hater” who cared only for sports, Graff states that it was not until entrance of college that he started to dive into more academic type readings. Like many young boys Graff read sports magazines and autobiographies of sports stars. These are topics that are normally viewed as novel and commonly pigeon hole their readers as being anti-intellectual. This is not necessarily the case though, as Graff so eloquently points out. According to him this is simply intellectualism acquired by other means. Although this may seem like a lofty idea, Graff makes a strong case for his theory.

He points out that growing up in a tough neighborhood; he had to make the choice between being openly smart or being beaten for being too smart. But in this decision and his debates with friends, albeit over sports, movies, or toughness, he was in the state of becoming an intellectual, even before he realized it was happening. During his lack or realization, he started to as he says, “learn the rudiments of the intellectual life.” This life that consisted of “how to make an argument, weigh different kinds of evidence, move between particulars and generalizations, summarize the views of other, and enter a conversation about ideas.” However, Graff’s first arguments were not about Shakespeare or the state of America or anything other topic labeled academic. His arguments were about baseball and movies and other topics deemed that lacked much intellect. But at the time these topics are what were most interesting to him. And at the time, these topics were more intellectual than anything he covered in school.

The problem according to Graff is that teachers do not tap into these resources enough. He says that “schools and colleges are missing an opportunity when they do not encourage students to take their nonacademic interests as objects of academic study.” The idea behind this is to take what seems as non-academia and look at it through different eyes; academic eyes to be exact. Graff encourages the educator to encourage the student in this essay. Because in getting the student to look at their main interests through different eyes, may open them up to what has been deemed as academia all along. 

You Should, I Should, They Should, So Forth and So on

Growing up I was fairly interested in reading books. By fairly interested I mean that I was the three time winner of the "book race" in my elementary school. This is no small feat at a school that consisted of roughly 473 students. I won these book races by reading about things that interested me. Sports, music, popular culture, etc. Reading was, and still is a past time of mine. I do not think I am some "higher than thou" person just because I read. Considering that I'm an English major I'm sure I'm surrounded by people that read consistently and potentially more than I do. These people that surround me are most likely more intellectual than me in regards to most academic areas. However, I have gained intellecualism by a different means. Now maybe I can't get into an in-depth conversation about Shakespeare or Chomskyan linguistics, but if you want to discuss the significance of this years Final Four or about the rise of garage rock in the early part of last decade I would be more than happy to engage in conversation. The significance of this though is that the reading that I have done has brought me to a place where I want to learn about the classic works of literature and the different linguistic approaches.

Gaining intellectualism through different means is important because it can be applied to almost any person in any form of society. Granted this may seem like a no brainer, I do not know that it is. Take for instance if someone is interested in pop culture. Although this is normally a lightly thought out topic and a majority of pop culture is show and not any kind of worthy tell, a young girl could learn to form an argument on why Lady Gaga is significant to society. Now granted I can not see any strong formula for a case on these grounds, part of that girls gaining intellectualism could be a part of anaylzing and developing new ideas to create valid points. This also applies to some young boy who happens to love sports. His knowledge of statistics and facts on baseball could help him get in challenging arguments on the game. The importance of this is that, while the classic works stay available and true, they will not always be appealing to people. However, there topics of conitnual change that will interest even the most clueless of people. Getting these people to tap into those topics and discovering their significance can develop intellect.

Maybe I Have "Hidden Intellectualism"

In the enlightening essay "Hidden Intellectualism," Gerald Graff brings a valid point about the acquisition of education and a different approach to becoming more intellectual. Graff supports his argument from a first person point of view in which he goes into detail about his reading interests and how they lacked "educational qualities." However it was not that he was an anti-intellectual but instead he was gaining intellectualism by other means. He also points out that while he was trying to balance between proving he was smart and being tough, that he started to gain even more intellect. I thought that his points were interesting because they are things I can relate to. Even to this day I am more in tuned with an argument about sports or some popular culture. However, I always considered these just to be novelty type arguments that didn't really have anything to do with intellect. His main points about seeing interests through "academic eyes" reminds me of one of my favorite writers, an essayist named Chuck Klosterman. Klosterman writes predominately on pop culture but he does so with such an intellect that the reader can't help but think a little differently after reading his work. I would add to this essay by going into my own examples of gaining intellect through seemingly irrelevant arguments and also use some of Klosterman's examples.

We are proud of you

Tonight I went to a high school basketball game. My alma mater which I am still unconditionally (and a little disturbingly) committed to was playing. I enjoy basketball and, with that said, I apparently enjoy high school too because at this very time in my life I am training to be a high school teacher. My aspirations besides that are to be a basketball coach. I've lived a life that is mildly ambitious about accomplishing realistic goals. I have no perception of living life to the fullest. The lack of my goals in life being prodigious is not what I care to discuss though. My greatest concern at this very time is the fact that the cheerleaders at this game --in spite of their peppiness and desire to look like women much older than they (which they may or may not have accomplished)-- had to lead some of the worst cheers/chants in the history of competitive sports. I didn't fully understand some of them and there was flawed logic in most of them.

Now, being active in sports and only acknowledging the cheerleaders when I gawked at them, I know not what makes a good cheer good, nor a bad cheer bad. There are people out there who do, however, I am not trained in the art. One cheer that stood out to me in particularly was one that insisted "the Devils can't be beat." Yes, my high school's mascot is the devil, no I do not think that the devil is the undisputed champion of competitive sports. I found this to be, quite frankly, idiotic. I deemed it this because the team had actually been beaten five times this season. Count them: one, two, three, four, FIVE!! Now I have no doubt that this is probably a quality cheer to start the season off with, or when you're the 2007 New England Patriots up to the point of the Super Bowl. I can accept that. I might even cheer along. But these seem the only exceptions. Definitely not when you're team has proven on five different occasions that they are, in fact, very beatable.

Thinking this though, took me back about a decade to when I was in the 7th grade. I played football like many 12 year old boys do and the team I was on proved in every game of the season that we were beatable. We didn't just prove it, we almost reveled in it. Now, let me come to defense for my teammates and I. We were not well coached and we were undersized, slow Caucasian boys that were a little late in puberty. Beating us was not a large task. Don't think I'm exaggerating this either. We didn't even score a touchdown until there were two games left in the season. But such as memories go, what I think about the most when I remember that Fall is not that we lost every game, or the fact that I was scared every time I touched the ball. No, what I remember are the cheerleaders. After every game we lost my teammates and I would walk, heads hanging down, back to the sidelines. And the only thing we had to walk back to were our cheerleaders chanting "We are proud of you, we said are proud of you." This always was, and always will be, insult to injury. Getting murdered in football in front of your peers and elders can be traumatizing to a middle school boy. But this traumatic experience becomes tenfold when there are schoolgirls trying to cheer you up over that defeat. They know not the humiliation. And at the time, even right now, I always find it hard to believe that a group of 12 year old girls actually took pride in my lackluster performance in a football game. They didn't know about the game, they probably didn't know what it took to win. But that is not the point. The point is that cheerleaders, as harmless as they might seem, can really devour a boy's confidence. Sure their's was a harmless attempt at cheering us up. But I didn't want to be cheered up, I wanted to win a game.

Nobody wants pity cheers. Nobody wants illogical cheers. It's time this was realized.

Prose of a Lost Boy

Why did I do it? Why did I start this essay without any idea as to what I was going to write about? No attempt at pre-writing, no outline, no real though as to what it was going to be about. I was once told that a personal essay can be about whatever you choose as long as you made it two things: true and interesting. I'm not sure if this essay will be either one of those things. Well, it will most likely be true. However, I am not full enough of myself to honestly believe that anything that comes from my fingertips, from my mouth, or from my brain for that matter, is going to be interesting to the general public. There are those people out in the world who's words almost demand attention. My dad is one of these guys. I feel that he somehow possesses the ability to make people listen. Most world leaders are like this. Many stars somehow convince people to listen but they usually have nothing to say. I am not one of these people though. I tend to fumble around with words I want and usually use many out of context. I get caught up in what I'm saying, or writing, and it generally makes no sense. Almost like what I am writing now. I still do not know what this essay is about. It will probably be about my flaws. But it might be about other people flaws. Or maybe it will be about dogs. Or maybe I will try to dissect my brain and make that interesting. Why did I do it?