Preview

Blue Collar

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
686 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Blue Collar
Blue- Collar workers are the ones that deserve the most respect in this world. They work so hard to perfect what they actually do. In the short passage Mike Rose expresses his own emotion not only towards his life but he basically broke it down for us piece by piece. He starts off by telling us his experience with being with his mom in the restaurant that she works at when he was a little kid. He learned a lot of things about the restaurant when he was there; most importantly he learned the hardship of being an adult.
He tells us how is mom was always on point with things like scanning the restaurant like she was a hawk for people that needed help and to satisfy their needs because they were the valuable customers. He would say how she would make work easier for the workers because she knew that everyone has their own little problem so she had to speak with them with a tone they will make them more comfortable with their work instead of making them more sad or upset because she wanted to make not only the customers happy but also her fellow co-workers. She did many more things than just that, the way she served her customers were amazing to him because of how many plates she can hold in both arms and how she can remember each and every one of the orders for which customer. He knew the mental and physical work his mom goes through all from watching his mom work every day. It takes intelligence to run a restaurant the way his mom does. As Mike Rose said “She never wasted a single movement” (Pg. 246) which she never does as you can tell.
Soon Mike started talking about education how he struggled throughout freshman year but he soon realized how education can help him make a life for himself. He went on to study humanities, social and psychological science. He taught for 10 years then went back to grad school to study even more. He believes that intelligence is closely associated with formal education- the type of schooling a person has. (Pg. 247) This was his train

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Better Essays

    Her first task was to find a place to live. She opts out of her decision to leave in a convenient and affordable apartment for a five hundred dollar a month efficiency that is about forty-five minutes away from the employment opportunities Key West has to offer. Her next task was job searching. Ehrenreich applied for numerous jobs, and learns about the low-wage job application process. These job applications usually just involved several multiple-choice questions and a urine test. After not hear back from any of the jobs, Ehrenreich applies for a waitressing position at the diner “Hearthside,” (which is not the actual name as well as the names of associates she comes in contact with). Ehrenreich is offered the position of a waitress and is hired at Hearthside and works the night shift working from 2:00 in the evening until 10:00 at night for $2.43 an hour, plus tips. If a person strives to make means off six and seven dollars an hour, surely $2.43 is not sufficed, especially when customers do not like tip the…

    • 1072 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Mike Rose's description about his mother is extremely detailed, and it clearly discusses blue collar brilliance in detail. How his mother had to develop certain skills to be a restaurant waitress, and be successful by handling all the customers demands effectively. Skills like for example memory strategies, physiological needs, memorizing, managing feelings, and human behavior; these skills helped her survive for her, and her family. Rosa (Mike’s mother) clearly needed to be efficient at her job to be able to provide for her family, and certain customers were not the best ones and arrived with attitudes or special needs due to rough days, and Rosa had to learn how to handle each situation by giving them the best service.…

    • 216 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    These past few weeks in class, I have found myself really questioning my own understanding of education. The article “The Achievement of Desire” by Richard Rodriguez has showed me that people have very different experiences with their education. Rodriguez describes himself as a child: successful, a scholar, eager to learn, and the perfect student. He also describes his changes as he continues to grow in his academics. He surpasses his parents in intelligence and soon realizes that he is becoming so different than them that they can’t even hold a conversation. Rodriguez then continues, arguing that education distances people from their families and origins.…

    • 612 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In “I Just Wanna Be Average”, Mike Rose tells the story of his high school experience and how his Stanford-Binet IQ test score got mixed up with another guy with the same Sir name; he was subsequently placed on a vocational track; which was the lowest class placement you could be assigned. We hear about a few of the classes he took over the four years, English, PE, Spanish, and Voc. Ed. Rose tells us about one teacher in particular, Mr. MacFarland, his senior year college prep English class, and how he insured Rose that he was great and to do anything he desired. With the encouragement of one teacher, Rose was able to break out of the dead-end education and excel in college.…

    • 931 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    His grandfather became well know in this town he could fix anything, “he was a master electrician, plumber, carpenter, mason, mechanic” (New York CNN) meaning even with no education anyone could work Blue-Collar jobs, but he performed these jobs/duties with no education and he worked just as hard as the people who got their education for these jobs. Rowe also sees that higher education is pointless to an extent because you can work at all these amazing jobs with no education. Mike Rowe also experience some Blue-Collar jobs if you ever seen the show “Dirty Jobs” he goes around preforming a lot of Blue-Collar jobs with no experience, but he learns a lot of the duties that the workforce requires and he wouldn’t have learned all these qualities sitting inside a classroom. Now Mike Rowe has qualities that could make he a hero just like his grandfather because he is skilled in so many different job…

    • 725 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Case Study: Sarah

    • 494 Words
    • 2 Pages

    As Sarah grew older, she began to understand the struggle her parents went through to ensure she had a fair chance at living the American dream. Grateful for her parents, she tried and helped with as much as she could, while maintaining good grades in school. As soon as Sarah turned 16, she began to look for a part-time job so that she was able to provide for her family. Throughout High School, Sarah was forced to sacrifice having a social life so that she was able to work in her free time bussing tables at a local Italian restaurant.…

    • 494 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Rose explains how Rosie became fluent at reading social cues and managing feelings of the…

    • 758 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    When someone is called intelligent, people automatically think of how book smart someone is. Book smart relates to how much information about math, science, and english a person knows. In Hidden Intellectualism, Graff brings up the idea that intelligence isn’t all about a scholarly form of thinking. “Everyone knows some young person who is impressively “street smart” but does poorly in school” is the first line of Graff’s essay (Graff 787). Nowadays, it is popular for a person to have the experience and knowledge for an everyday environment but lack knowledge in educational studies. A reasonable answer for this problem could be that schools aren’t tapping into subjects other than the worn out academics that quickly in-interest students.…

    • 523 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Rhetorical Analysis

    • 849 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Many people in today’s society tend to believe that a good education is the fastest way to move up the ladder in their chosen. People believe that those who seek further education at a college or university are more intelligent. Indeed, a college education is a basic requirement for many white collar, and some blue collar, jobs. In an effort to persuade his audience that intelligence cannot be measured by the amount of education a person has Mike Rose wrote an article entitled “Blue Collar Brilliance”. The article that appeared in the American Scholar, a quarterly literary magazine of the Phi Beta Kappa Society, established in 1932. The American Scholar audience includes, Company’s , Employees, Educators, Students, CEO’s, and many others. Author Mike Rose questions assumptions about intelligence, work and the social class. In the article, Rose uses Audience, Purpose, and Rhetorical Strategies to help the reader form an opinion on intelligence.…

    • 849 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Vocation of Eloquence

    • 438 Words
    • 2 Pages

    “Let us suppose that some intelligent man has been chasing status symbols all his life, until suddenly the bottom falls out of his world and he sees no reason for going on. He can’t make his solid gold Cadillac represent his success or his reputation or his sexual potency anymore: now it seem to him only absurd and a little pathetic. No psychiatrist or clergyman can do him any good, because his state of mind is neither sick nor sinful: he’s wrestling with his angel. He discovers immediately that he wants more education, and he wants in the same way that a starving man wants food. But he wants education of a particular kind. His intelligence and emotions may be quite well be in fine shape. It’s his imagination that’s been staved and fed on shadows, and its education in that that he specifically wants and needs.”…

    • 438 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Summary, Blue Collar

    • 1106 Words
    • 5 Pages

    In America most people generally think that blue collar workers are less intelligent than white collar or professional workers. Sadly this commonly held belief is just as prevalent today as it has ever been. In spite of the fact that there is evidence to the contrary this assumption still causes people to be stereotyped and treated differently.…

    • 1106 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    What does it mean to be well educated or to be “smart”? Standardized tests are one-dimensional but the beauty of people is that we are all unique and creative in our mind-set. Smith (2002), a Rank Research Fellow and Tutor at YMCA George Williams College Gardner, defines intelligence through Howard Gardner’s seven multiple theories: linguistic, logical, musical, kinesthetic, spatial, interpersonal, and intrapersonal. He claims that “people have a unique blend of intelligences” and that our biggest challenge “is how best to take advantage of the uniqueness conferred on us as a species exhibiting several intelligences” (p. 1). It is a rare gift to obtain all seven intelligences, thus we must…

    • 1611 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Better Essays

    College Education Flaws

    • 1299 Words
    • 6 Pages

    Martin Luther King, Jr., an American minister, activist, and leader in the Civil Rights Movement, once said, “The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. Intelligence plus character—that is the goal of true education.” King is pointing out that education is meant to challenge people in order to shape their minds and thoughts. The importance of education has been written about countless times. Many intelligent writers have written articles on higher education, such as Horace Mann’s “From Report of the Massachusetts Board of Education, 1848,” Jean Anyon’s “From Social Class and the Hidden Curriculum of Work,” and John Taylor Gatto’s “Against School.” In their writings they point out the flaws in the…

    • 1299 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    PGCE Module 1 Assignment

    • 3987 Words
    • 13 Pages

    Education empowers individuals to contribute to society, fulfil their personal talents, fulfil their civic responsibilities and carry tradition forward (Trilling and Hood, 2001:9).…

    • 3987 Words
    • 13 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    The narrator's first job was working as a porter for a man named, Mr. Hoffman. During the time he was working here, he always thought that Mr. Hoffman and his wife performed in a manner to disintegrate him and that they were just out to destroy him. One day, he came to a conclusion and realization that, he had "grossly misread the motives and attitudes of Mr. Hoffman and his wife" (888). He apprehended that they did indeed care about him keeping his job even after he had not shown up for three days. He knew that any other white owner would have told him to go somewhere else to work. After an embarrassing lie, he told the owner, he finally quit his job and searched for a new job as a dishwasher.…

    • 618 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays