Answer:
While reading Gerald Graff’s essay, “Hidden Intellectualism”, Graff claims that there are many people in which knows of someone who tends to be vernacular to the point where they are considered to be “street smart”. Graff exposes in his essay that intellect goes beyond the academia and scholarly form of thinking, that knowledge can also take the form within what Graff considers “street smarts”. Graff then goes on to argue that schools should take these “street smarts” and “channel them into good academic work”.
"The man who was almost a man" speaks of Dave, who had conflicts with gaining recognition and respect, because he was young. He wanted to grow up and become a man. For this he bought a weapon, thinking that it would make him grow as a man. Seeking power, he buys this weapon, to feel powerful, unstoppable. All these conflicts of the dave age led him to make some bad decisions. The story well specifies this when he accidentally shoots a mule, and he cannot sustain the excuse he made up for it, and when he decides to take a train and go to a city where he would be able to man up.
