Knowledge Attains Power

Knowledge Attains Power

Blake Masterson
Professor Manry
English 1113
23 September 2010
Knowledge Obtains Power
Society is divided into sections depending on race, gender, social class, wealth, and knowledge. All of these topics contribute to a person’s opportunities in life. The ability to obtain knowledge is not available for everybody, but it is necessary to survive in today’s society. In Gregory Mantsios’ “Class in America,” C.H Knoblauch’s “Literacy and the Politics of Education,” and Johnathan Kozol’s “Still Separate, Still Unequal,” each author expresses their beliefs of education, social status, and power through attaining knowledge. These author’s opinions vary on the topics, but this paper will categorize each author’s viewpoint by the relationship that they see between social class, education, and power, while also giving my personal opinion on these topics.
Education is key in the development of a person’s mindset. It establishes core values and skills that are required for maturing. A student acquires education through schooling. Kozol’s perspective in his writings suggests that a student’s relationship to education is very unequal and unfairly distributed. He believes that their race and social class characterize a student in the educational system. Not only do they receive a lesser level of academics, but they are even treated with less respect then the other students. Kozol believes that there is a strong lack of equality in education, and that it highly affects minorities. Mantsios says that, “All Americans do not have an equal opportunity to succeed” (Mantsios 484). Mantsios believes that students are hindered academically by their standings in society. He says that it is extremely rare for a lower-class student to be educated like an upper-class student. Knoblauch would state that a student’s relationship to education is dependent on their development of literacy. He also describes the importance of literacy in education by portraying that literacy brings...

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