Siau 1 Abby Siau Professor Bolton English 101 17 October 2013 Everyone is an Intellectual Most people consider intellectuals

to be geeks or nerds, but they are not looking deeper into the subject. It is true that most popular intellectuals are doctors, professors, scientists, etc. However, some intellectuals are other than book smart. Street smart or common sense is needed the most in a persons everyday life. The groups of people that use common sense and street smarts would be sports and extracurricular activities. In the essays Hidden Intellectualism by Gerald Graff and Anti-Intellectualism: Why We Hate the Smart Kids by Grant Penrod, they both argue the idea of intellectuals. Ideas such as who make up intellectuals and what intellectuals consists of are some of the concepts these authors argue. Graff argues that intellectualism is found in any shape or form and is not always present in a school environment. Penrod argues that intellectualism is only found in a school environment, and one cannot get far without education. In this case, I agree with Graff on his idea that intellectualism is found in all shapes and forms. Book smarts, common sense, and street smarts are all forms of intellectualism. Both Penrod and Graff provide interesting claims, but Graffs essay is a more effective argument because of its use of logos and ethos. In Hidden Intellectualism by Gerald Graff, Graff uses an abundance of logos in order to support his reasoning, but Anti-Intellectualism: Why We Hate the Smart Kids by Grant Penrod does not. In the essay, Graff states that Sports is only one of the domains whose potential for

Siau 2 literacy training (and not only for males) is seriously underestimated by educators, who see sports as competing with academic development rather than a route to it (203). This is in fact a logos. People overlook the actual depth of thought and academics present in athletics. Athletics also requires the use of intellectualism. Instead of academics that people study in schools, athletes use common sense and street smarts. These too are forms of intellectualism. Graff supports this claim by saying: Only much later did it dawn on me that the sports world was more compelling that school because it was more intellectual than school, not less. Sports after all was full of challenging arguments, debates, problems for analysis, and intricate statistics that you could care about, as school conspicuously was not. I believe that street smarts beat out book smarts in our culture not because street smarts are nonintellectual, as we generally suppose, but because they satisfy an intellectual thirst more thoroughly than school culture, which seems pale and unreal. (202) Graff is supporting this claim by providing examples of how sports include challenging mind games. He explains how sports are not only a physical work out. Sports involve heavy mental exercise as well. From being involved in sports, I can concur that this is in fact a logos. Sports do involve heavy thinking and planning out. They are not just constant reactions. In Penrods essay, he states any drive toward intelligence or education becomes laughable in the eyes of media-inundated young people (756). This means that anybody that is popular by media such as athletes, actors, and singersare not educated. This is an example of a hasty generalization fallacy. Penrod is jumping to conclusions without any logical support of this statement. Intellectualism can be derived from any given career that a person holds. Graffs

Siau 3 specific use of logos allows the readers to think deeper into the idea of what athletes and other talented people endure as far as intellectualism goes. Ethos are also used in order to present credibility, and it allows the readers to trust what Graff is arguing. However, Penrod is not able to provide this credibility. Graff believes that in order to keep the students that do not do well in normal academic studies, schools should offer areas of study that students are actually interested in. Graff wants his readers to agree with what he is saying by encouraging this idea: *Students+ would be more prone to take on intellectual identities if we encouraged them to do so at first on subjects that interest them rather than ones that interest us (199). Students will be more willing to learn about things that interest them rather than what interest oth ers. This is Graffs opinion, but it also allows his readers to trust in what he is saying. In Penrods essay, this kind of education is not recognized. Penrod thinks that intellectualism and extracurricular activities are not related. Graff is trying to find a happy medium. Another way Graff provides credibility is that he *offers his+ own adolescent experience as a case in point (199). He believed himself to be an anti -intellectual due to his obsession with sports magazines. This way, his readers understand that he too knows the intellectualism involved in sports. Both essays did include strong claims supporting their arguments. However, Graffs essay, Hidden Intellectualism, provided more logos and ethos to support his claim, and it lacked fallacies unlike Penrods essay. Penrod used hasty generalization fallacies plus many others as well. Penrod was very judgmental toward the stereotypical intellectuals described as geeks and nerds. This is where his fallacies were present. When an author includes fallacies, he or she is typically expressing a mistaken belief. This may offend or upset the

Siau 4 readers of that essay. This gave the readers a negative perspective of intellectuals. Graff was more specific on terms of intellectualism. Graff defined intellectuals very specifically. He explained intellectuals as people that use common sense, street smarts, and book smarts. Overall, Graffs essay was not only logical and trustworthy; it was entertaining and well presented. It was very well supported, and it provided specific claims and ideas.

Siau 5 Works Cited Graff, Gerald. Hidden Intellectualism. They Say I Say. 2nd ed. Ed. Gerald Graff, and Cathy Birkenstein. New York: Norton, 2010. 198-205. Print. Penrod, Grant. Anti-Intellectualism: Why We Hate the Smart Kids. The Norton Field Guide to Writing with Readings and Handbook. 3rd ed. Ed. Marilyn Moller. New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 2013. 754-757. Print.