Nicole Allen Pond AP English 5 September 2017 Outliers Essay “A statistical observation that is markedly different in value from the others of the sample” (Gladwell 3) or in other words an outlier. In the novel Outliers: The Story of Success, author Malcolm Gladwell holds one of the many secrets to life, the secret to success. Gladwell takes one’s thoughts on an astonishing journey to reveal the keys to success, their patterns, and how to achieve it. It all starts with The Matthew Effect or accumulated advantage. The Matthew Effect is the concept that the rich get richer and the poor get more poor. Gladwell makes his first realization of this during the Memorial Cup hockey championship. As he’s looking at the roster of each player his wife makes note of something and brings it to Gladwell’s attention. Both teams star …show more content…
The theory that the more one practices the better one becomes. To follow the dream of excellence you must practice your assignment for a total of 10,000 hours or more. “The students who would end up the best in their class began to practice more than everyone else: six hours a week by age nine, eight hours a week by age twelve, sixteen hours by age fourteen, and up and up, until the age of twenty they were practicing well over thirty hours a week” (39) in a sense this excerpt confirms what society has told people for years, that practice makes perfect. Of course some people are born with raw talent, however how does one expect to improve their abilities if they do not rehearse. Anyone can be mediocre without practice, but in order to make it in the big shots one must give their one hundred and ten percent to beat out the competition. It’s all about how one distinguishes themself from another and the only way to do that is to show off that skill that has been practiced repeatedly. Preferably 10,000 hours
Outlier. An outlier is someone who is not considered to be a normal person within society. They have qualities that most people do not obtain. They are the most successful of individuals and many aspire to be them. Michael Jackson is the epitome of what I believe is a true outlier. In his best-selling novel, Malcolm Gladwell stated that we tend to spend more time looking at individuals success rather than looking at things that ultimately contributed to that success, such as their family, birthplace, and even birth date.
I found Gladwell’s first chapter of Outliers entitled “The Matthew Effect” to be both interesting, confusing, and perhaps somewhat lopsided. Based on Matthew 25:2, Gladwell simply explains, “It is those who are successful, in other words, who are most likely to be given to the kinds of special opportunities that lead to further success.” (Gladwell 2008, pg. 30) The Matthew Effect seems to extend special advantages and opportunities to some simply based on their date of birth.
In Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell expresses his theory of success through the 10,000 hour rule that is used to associate practice with success and achieving certain goals. He strives to influence the audience of his point of view and assumptions of successful people throughout the history of the world. Gladwell relates to various historical figures and people of well known talent and intelligence. As the author, Malcolm Gladwell believes to be very knowledgeable, influential throughout the novel. Although he provides interesting facts and statistics to his piece, Gladwell is unable to establish credibility to this information. During college and high school, he did not attain high grades that altered his decision to engage in advertising. After being rejected numerous times, he was later accepted to a journalism position. His insufficient experience and skills contributes to his low credibility and reliability. Gladwell aims to persuade or influence the audience of the importance of practice to fulfill success by also trying to teach the reader new skills. He reaches out to society to capture his inspiring discoveries including young adults in particular who are aspiring to grasp their desired dreams. He introduces the 10,000 hour rule as a goal to reach around the age of twenty or higher. Gladwell compares the lives of professional hockey players, Bill Gates, the Beatles, and Mozart to display their achievements in their later lives due to the amount of experience and practice they were able to endure. He claims that with exactly 10,000 hours of practice, expert level will be sustained in any given skill. Although Gladwell expresses his knowledge and theories of success through devices that exemplify logos and repetition of the 10,00...
In “Outliers” Malcolm Gladwell organizes his argument for their being a rule for overall success by showing statistics of people who are defined as being successful such as Bill Gates, Billy Joy, and The Beatles. He also uses a Berlin music academy to help prove his rule. He presents an argument that Bill Gates and The Beatles and the violinist attending the music academy may have been born with innate talent but that is not the sole ...
I think Gladwell’s book is an interesting science. I am not sure I know enough to say it is good science yet, but the Medicine Hat Tigers example he used is surely a convincing argument for good science. Gladwell cleverly redirected the reader’s attention to the birthdays of the Tigers rosters, something a Psychologist (Roger Barnsley) had done some time ago also pointed out by Gladwell in his book. But what Gladwell did that could be construed as good science is replace the players’ names with their birthdays to highlight when the more successful players on the team were born, January, February, March and April to be exact. This is good science if the discovery’s technique was used to draft players in all sports going forward as seems to be the indication in Gladwell’s book.
In the minds of many, intelligence not only excels your experience in education, but is also the key to a successful career. In Outliers: The Story of Success, Malcolm Gladwell refutes this thought by expanding on the belief that intelligence can only take you so far, and that creativity and innovation tend to lead to just as much success. This thought process applies to many different levels of life including our interview and acceptance into the ACTION program.
In the book “Outliers: The Story of Success” authored by Malcolm Gladwell, he explains what an outlier is and what it means to be “successful”. Throughout the novel, Gladwell provides examples by writing different stories in nine various chapters to support his claim. Gladwell believes that success isn’t gained by natural talent, but by the effects of other circumstances and that these people are called outliers. It’s the argument of nature vs. nurture that Gladwell wants to address in his book. Many people in society would think that a particular person is successful due to the individual’s natural talents, although that can be true to a certain extent, Gladwell wants to disapprove that idea in people’s mind and wants the public to look at
Once in a while, it really hits people that they don’t have to experience the world in the way they have been told to. Gladwell believes that cultural legacies are powerful forces. Cultural legacies are the customs of a family or a group of people, that is inherited through the generations. According to Malcolm Gladwell’s book, Outliers, Cultural legacies is something that’s been passed down for generations to generations. It depends on what type of legacies was passed that will affect a person. If a good legacy was passed down, someone can keep that legacy going by trying hard at keeping the legacies going. If a bad legacy was passed down; I believe that cultural legacies can be altered or changed, by good working habits, determination, and a positive mindset to succeed. Culture can affect either positively or negatively, but we have the power to turn our cultural
Outliers-The Story of Success is a sociological, and psychological non-fiction book, which discusses success, and the driving reasons behind why some people are significantly more successful than others. Malcolm Gladwell explains this by dividing the book into two parts, opportunity and legacy. Opportunity discusses how select people are fortunate enough to be born between the months of January through March, and also includes the idea that those who are already successful will have more opportunities to improve and become even more successful. The 10,000-hour rule proves the idea that in order to become successful in a certain skill, one must have practiced that skill for at least 10,000 hours. In addition to the 10,000-hour rule, timing is also a major component that implies being in the right place at the right time, which brings the author to discuss Bill Gates who was born during the time where programming and computer technology was emerging, therefore sparking his interest in computers, later bringing him to create Microsoft. Another point Gladwell brings forth is the notion of one’s upbringing, race, and ethnicity can be a factor behind their success. And lastly, pursuing meaningful work will cause one to continue working with their skill and not give up. Legacy is a collection of examples that support the idea: values are passed down from generation to generation, which may cause a certain group of people to be more persistent in a skill, or occupation.
In Chapter 8 and 9 of Outliers: The Story of Success, Gladwell exams some of the ways that Asian and American students learn math, arguing that some of the principles in the US education system should be reconsidered. I generally agree with Gladwell’s point of view. I believe in two ways, students ' principal spirit and the length of students’ studying, the US education system leaves much to be desired, though an overhaul is in progress.
After reading the introduction in the book Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell, I was struck by some interesting information and noticed things within the introduction that were relevant to my life. In the introduction, Gladwell basically gave a summary of a town called Roseto. He went on to explain that the people that lived in Roseto never died of heart dieses and other illnesses because of the way their community grew up. The information was very intriguing. In Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell states, “For men over sixty-five, the death rate from disease in Roseto was roughly half that of the United States as a whole” (Gladwell 7). This information within the book was highly shocking to me. How could this be possible? I continued reading, and the shocking statement was better explained. As the introduction continued, Malcolm Galdwell said, “The Rosetans were healthy because of where they were from, because of the world they had created for themselves in their tiny little town in the hills” (Gladwell 9). When reading this, I was flabbergasted. How did how one lives have anything to do with ones health? It was striking to me because I never connected life style to health. After reading the introduction, the information taught me that how one lives does result in how one’s health and life span may be. After reading the introduction, some of the information seemed relevant to my life. Malcolm Gladwell exclaimed, “They looked at how the Rosetans visited one another, stopping to chat in Italian on the street, say, or cooking for one another in their backyards” (Gladwell 9). This is relevant to my life because I grow up in very conservative and close knit family. Like the citizens of Roseto, I live differently than the normal teenagers ...
The effects of practicing and improvement in a players performance is key to the game of basketball when a player practices for basketball they are improving because they are either getting a better basketball IQ or improving in the fundamentals like shooting and passing and dribbling a player can not get too good on these attributes so it encouraged that players always practice. Then again there is that player who never practices the fundamentals and never improves on his basketball IQ will not be able to be successful in part of basketball. When there is no practicing with a player he will not be able to discern what to do in practice or in games. The player will also have a struggle working with his teammates if he does not practice. Which leads me to my next topic on why practicing can change the way a player can learn how to play and cooperate with his teammates.
“Outliers: The Story of Success” is one of the non-fiction books written by Malcolm Gladwell. In the book, the author examines the factors that contribute to the high levels of success. The author adds that success is combined with a number of key factors such as hard work, opportunity and other factors like when and where the person was born. The books gives an insight into various un-answered questions such as why the majority of Canadian ice hockey players are born in the first few months of the calendar year or how The Beatles became one of the most successful musical band in the world. According to Gladwell, success is not only about innate talent but depends on various external factors and situations.
Source: "Practice Makes Perfect? Not so Much." MSUToday. Zach Hambrick, Andy Henion, 20 May 2013. Web. 04 May 2014. .
There are the rich and poor in the society, and it somehow creates positive and negative cycles. That is, the rich can get better education and have good opportunities to succeed in the society.