Blue Collar Brilliance Summary

Mike Rose’s introduces his argument by explaining the intelligence of blue collar workers and emphasizing his belief that blue-collar jobs require certain skills and tasks acquired by experience, and should not be viewed as menial tasks held by uneducated people. He goes on to point out that there are many people that feel “intelligence is…the type of schooling a person has…[and] work requiring less school requires less intelligence,” but then goes on to explain why this belief is simply not true. Rose starts with the story of his mother, Rosie, and describes what he has observed of her intelligence throughout the years of his childhood, as he

In past years, when people was talking about higher education, they had no hesitation to mention university immediately. When others were mentioning that college also belonged to higher education, sometimes they reacted with a wry smile, and shook their heads. Yes, even if it is for today, university gets the higher appraisal than college, and even many people think ‘‘college as America used to understand it is coming to an end.’’ As parents, they prefer their children to study in university instead of college, no matter how high of tuition the university it is. They ignore the value of college. Although sometimes college is viewed as critical by other people, we still can find its value, and how it is really beneficial for our lives, even if we don’t pursue a degree.

In the article “Blue Collar Brilliance”, Mike Rose emphasizes that blue collar jobs should be recognized for their amount of work and intelligence levels required. Usually in today’s world, blue collar jobs are viewed as monotonous tasks that require little or no ability or intellect. Rose argues that individuals often judge people who work in blue collar jobs based on the level of education. Rose’s argument is that formal education does not define the level of intelligence in a person. He made his argument effective by providing the idea and evidence that intelligence should be respected, regardless of where it is learned or gained.

“You can’t judge a book by it’s cover”. Every day our parents tell us as children that we cannot judge things based on the first glances that we see. However, people in our society today have filled their heads with stereotypes in order to judge people and their abilities. And when hiring employees, stereotypes and first glances is all an employer sees and therefore care about. In her book, Nickel and Dimed, Barbara Ehrenreich proves that a person’s race and gender have a massive influence on the type of low-wage work a person can find, due to the stereotypes that are associated with gender and race in our society today.

First, being employed in the blue-collar industry a person must show intuition. Rose studied the habits of the blue-collar workplace, and based on his observations came to better understand how the job requires both physical and mental capabilities of an individual. The author Mike Rose, grew up in the 1940’s, this is an example of ethos in the story. Rose observed his mother, Rosie Rose work in a local restaurant as a waitress. Rose observed his mother’s impressive ability to retain food orders while keeping track of her list of side work was a skill demonstrating her intuitive capabilities that were learned out her

As Mike even began to study those who worked around the same level as that of his family, he began to piece together his belief that those of the “blue-collar” work force did have their own intelligence from “waitressing and hair styling to plumbing and welding.” (Rose 396) He noticed more and more of them portraying their own intelligence through their work. He says we “[separate] the body from the mind” instead of having them work together. (Rose 397) It was

First, in his article, Rose sets the scene by efficiently using personal anecdote as an essential to achieve the emotions of the readers to argue his claim. Rose introduces his readers

His argument does use pathos a little; citing the lower IQs, and that the people who own them may struggle trying to bend to American culture’s demand for a Bachelor’s Degree, tends to tug on the emotions of the reader, probably intentionally. This helps Murray a lot, for throughout the argument he has seemed very sure of his argument, and as earlier mentioned, often disdainful and lofty regarding the subject matter. Though an elitist, Murray is intelligent in his

His mother didn’t receive education since she withdrew from school by his father’s command that “a girl did not need education”. As a result, a housewife implied that you had “no job, no status, low self-esteem”. Even though there were no direct evidence showed that women had less sense of identity from their jobs in Tom Fryers’s article, his illustration had strongly reflected that women’s identity was disregarded. Women did not get the job opportunities they deserved to have. According to their content, two articles all mentioned women’s job identity, they had quite opposite point of views. Rebecca Riffkin used the real data to tell the truth that women are slightly more likely to get a sense of identity from their job than men. However, Tom Fryers stated that worker-identity still remained problematic for many woman.

Everyone has a dream, but not everyone has the courage to pursue their dream because of the fear of failing. "Blue-Collar Brilliance" by Mike Rose and "The Pursuit of Happyness" directed by Gabriele Muccino discusses where dedication takes a person in life. In the article of "Blue-Collar Brilliance" Rose, discusses the life of two successful individuals who have no education but are very dedicated to their work. "The Pursuit of Happyness" discuss the life of a struggling man who is not able to support his family, but never leaves the hope of one day becoming successful. "Blue-Collar Brilliance" and "The Pursuit of Happyness" share a common theme of, it does not matter whether a person has an education or not; it takes a lot of dedication to succeed. Both authors claim that everyone can be successful in their job as long as a person has patience and dedication. Composer Rose and Muccino both make an effective argument about dedication to their audience by providing real life experiences of an individual.

Barbara, a successful journalist and author, decided to conduct a Participant Observation experiment. Working as a waitress, maid, and at Walmart; Barbara discovered that low-wage employees are hard working have just as much knowledge and/or skills that the higher social classes. Employees are unaware of their own potential due to their situation and jobs. We, as a society, believe that the things we do, such as our jobs or education, reflect ourselves as people in terms of morality, work ethics, and overall life. Therefore people of the lower social class cut themselves short, give up their ambition, and have no inspiration due to their “acceptance” of what place they hold in the Social Hierarchy. This results is the Higher Social Classes remaining dominant and continue to set the guidelines for

As a result, the rose makes the reader feel the pride and fulfilment the rose would have felt for overcoming the odds of survival in

In America, there are innumerable types of jobs, and the jobs are split into two categories: blue collar and white collar. In the article, “White-Collar vs. Blue-Collar” by Ian Harrison these two categories are discussed. This article talks about the leverages and weaknesses of the jobs in these categories. The “White-Collar” jobs are more satisfying because the jobs offer more opportunities and are more challenging than other jobs.

First the point Rose is trying to make is by saying intelligence is not only associated with formal education and that blue collar work or service jobs require more intelligence than what people distinguish. He backs that claim up by talking about his mother and how she didn’t have formal education working as a waiter nevertheless she was still intelligent due to the fact she remember orders and how she handled customers

Webster, Mary Jo. “Where the Jobs Are: The New Blue Collar.” USA Today. Gannett Satellite Information Network, 12 Jan. 2015. Web. 10 Dec. 2016