Rhetorical Analysis: America Needs Its Nerds

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In a passage from America Needs Its Nerds, Leonid Fridman writes about the flaws within the system of values in our society. The main fault he focuses on is that society only has disrespectful or demeaning terms such as geek and nerd for the “...intellectually curious and academically serious.” (Lines 3,4). Fridman continues to discuss the widespread of anti-intellectualism that takes place at all academic institutions including colleges and elementary schools. He utilizes numerous rhetorical techniques such as hyperbole, rhetorical question, and denotation and connotation to develop his argument that “America Needs Its Nerds” (Title) and it is time for anti-intellectualism to be stopped. “A geek, according to Webster’s New World Dictionary,

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