Sample Summaries of Emily Raine’s “Why Should I Be Nice to You” Sample Summary 1 Most people at some point in their life have worked in the service industry. This particular industry can be quite satisfying whether it be working in fine dining, as a cocktail waitress, or at a local diner, but for Emily Raine, who had done all of these things, the only place she ever felt “whipped” was working as a barista at one of largest specialty coffee chains in the world (358). Raine is bothered by how the café industry has set up the impersonal server/customer relationship and feels the best way to solve the issue is be to “be rude” (365). In 2005, Raine expanded in an essay that appeared in the online journal, Bad Subjects, on her frustration within the service industry and what good service really means. Good service in the coffee industry does not require much skill these days. Most people are usually talking on their cell phone while ordering their daily coffee and pastry while also paying and then out as fast as they walked into the café probably not even noticing or acknowledging any interaction with the people serving. The coffee sector has recognized this and has set up the counters as linear coffee bars that act the same as an assembly line. The workers are trained and assigned specific jobs in the coffee preparing process, such as taking the order, handling the money, making the drink, to delivery. This makes the interaction with the customer very limited, mostly just seconds. This is where Raine feels some of the problem with the customer and server interaction. Although this is the most effective and efficient way of working, Raine describes productive work as “dreary and repetitive” (359). Since the 1960’s companies have been branding themselves with the quality of having “good service” distinguishing them from the rest of the competition. Raines explains that in good service there is an exchange between two parties: “the ‘we’ that gladly serves and the ‘you’ that happily receives,” but also a third party, the boss, which is the ultimate decider on exactly what good service will be (360). Companies in the service industry must market their products on servers’ friendliness; therefore it is monitored and controlled from the people on top. Raine notes that cafés “layouts and management styles” help create a cozy atmosphere that plays a factor in good service, but in a way that will not disrupt the output (361). In Raine’s essay, she gives the example of an employee Starbucks has branded; “The happy, wholesome perfume-free barista” (361). She points out that the company offers workers stock options, health insurance, dental plans, as well as other perks of discounts and giveaways, while also using moving personal accounts from workers who “never deemed corporate America could care so much” (362). Raines also adds that the company does not give into unionization and although the company pay.

1. Sample Summaries of Emily Raine’s “Why Should I Be Nice to
You”
Sample Summary 1
Most people at some point in their life have worked in the
service industry. This particular
industry can be quite satisfying whether it be working in fine
dining, as a cocktail waitress, or at a local
diner, but for Emily Raine, who had done all of these things, the
only place she ever felt “whipped” was
working as a barista at one of largest specialty coffee chains in
the world (358). Raine is bothered by
how the café industry has set up the impersonal server/customer
relationship and feels the best way to
solve the issue is be to “be rude” (365). In 2005, Raine
expanded in an essay that appeared in the
online journal, Bad Subjects, on her frustration within the
service industry and what good service really
means.
Good service in the coffee industry does not require much skill
these days. Most people are
usually talking on their cell phone while ordering their daily
coffee and pastry while also paying and then
out as fast as they walked into the café probably not even
noticing or acknowledging any interaction
with the people serving. The coffee sector has recognized this
and has set up the counters as linear
coffee bars that act the same as an assembly line. The workers
are trained and assigned specific jobs in
the coffee preparing process, such as taking the order, handling

2. the money, making the drink, to
delivery. This makes the interaction with the customer very
limited, mostly just seconds. This is where
Raine feels some of the problem with the customer and server
interaction. Although this is the most
effective and efficient way of working, Raine describes
productive work as “dreary and repetitive” (359).
Since the 1960’s companies have been branding themselves with
the quality of having “good
service” distinguishing them from the rest of the competition.
Raines explains that in good service there
is an exchange between two parties: “the ‘we’ that gladly serves
and the ‘you’ that happily receives,”
but also a third party, the boss, which is the ultimate decider on
exactly what good service will be (360).
Companies in the service industry must market their products on
servers’ friendliness; therefore
it is monitored and controlled from the people on top. Raine
notes that cafés “layouts and management
styles” help create a cozy atmosphere that plays a factor in good
service, but in a way that will not
disrupt the output (361). In Raine’s essay, she gives the
example of an employee Starbucks has
branded; “The happy, wholesome perfume-free barista” (361).
She points out that the company offers
workers stock options, health insurance, dental plans, as well as
other perks of discounts and giveaways,
while also using moving personal accounts from workers who
“never deemed corporate America could
care so much” (362). Raines also adds that the company does
not give into unionization and although
the company pays “nominally more” than minimum wage, the
shifts are scheduled oddly and never add
up to 40 hours (362). Starbucks has so much pride about having

3. the happy worker, but Raines suggests
that the workers are not all smiles.
Raine expresses her frustration with how the café industry is
run. She compares it to a “smooth
piece of machinery” and says she found that most people
“pretend they are interacting with and
appliance” (362). As she is very versed in the service world,
Raine claims that the customers are much
ruder to café staff than any other sector of the service industry.
The average barista worker is not hired as an individual, but
rather as another piece of the
whole puzzle to sell the image that the corporation advertises
and wants the customer to believe. Like
any other service job in America, there are standards in hygiene
and appearance in the work place. “The
company issues protocols for hair length, color and
maintenance, visible piercings and tattoos as well as
personal hygiene and acceptable odorific products,” writes
Raines, as well as a uniform to wear to show
they are staff and unify them as one (363). It seems reasonable
that a coffee shop would not want
baristas to wear strong odors as it would contradict the
atmosphere they are working so hard to provide
to each customer that walks though their doors. As Raine
states, these rules are not “alarming” and
have actually been in place for hundreds of years (363). This is
what helps make the distinction from
server and customer and makes the contact between them simply
functional. This division is vital to
good service because class distinctions cause notions of service
quality. Raine admits that good service

4. quality does not only mean serving well, but also to allow the
customer to feel good and okay about
being served, usually resulting in “one-sided politeness” (364).
Raine concludes by declaring that “There is no easy way to
serve without being a servant.” She
goes on to say that the best thing for her to do is to just show
her “actual emotions” rather than
practicing patience and good will and as a server she would
have an individual identity at work and
refuse class distinctions; she would be rude, not all the time,
but when she felt it necessary (365).
Sample Summary 2
In Emily Raine’s 2005 essay “Why Should I Be Nice To You?
Coffee Shops and the Politics of
Good Service,” posted in the online journal Bad Subjects,
readers are let into the darker side of coffee
shop hospitality. Raine reveals just how limited baristas are
when providing customer service. Specialty
coffee shops have created robot-like employees where
individuality can rarely be seen. Raine points out
the limitations of the workers and the amount of control from
management and the overall
corporation..
Raine begins by elaborating on the process of working at
Starbucks. Customers are shuffled
through a line watching an assembly line of workers prepare
different parts of their indulgence. Not
more than a few seconds are spent with each employee. This
limited time does not prove to be enough
to provide true friendly customer service. Each one only has
time for a smile before their task is

5. complete and the customer is shifted to the next step in the
process. In creating this process, Starbucks
has bred a new class of employees. The employees are just as
branded and marketed as much as the
coffee they sell. They make it very public about how well the
employees are treated with benefits that
many others in the industry do not offer. They even go as far as
referring to the employee as “partners”
that are genuine in their great customer service. Yet, there are
ways they get around it by never giving a
full forty hour work week, scheduling abnormal shifts, and
paying very little over what the standard
minimum wage is set at.
Starbucks next way of controlling the employee is by
regulating their appearance. Standards are
set for hair, acceptable smells to be worn, and any kind of
visual piercing or tattoo that one has. This is
to make the employees stand out as the ones who are serving.
This many times gives the feeling to the
customer that they are above the employee since they are being
served by a person in uniform.
Customers tend to be bothered if an employee asks anything
other than a question related to their
order or showing their personality. Starbucks also has policies
on what consumers can see employees
do. Workers are expected to enter and exit through back doors.
They are not allowed to eat or drink in
front of the consumers. These are all ways of setting the worker
aside from the consumer. It gives the
illusion that the consumer is in a class above the workers, “the
public only see them as workers, as
makers of quality coffee, and never as possible peers.” By
giving the feeling of the class distinction
customers feel it is justified to give orders, and give no respect.
These consumers do not think about
what the worker does on their personal time, or the fact that at

6. some point the worker is the customer.
Those who work in these kinds of places usually do not argue
the rules or fight the system in any
way. The jobs are not meant to be long term so they simply quit
and walk away. Raine felt better by
being rude to her customers. She provided this rudeness when
she felt the customer deserved a
comeback of some sort.
Sample Summary 3
Emily Raine’s “Why Should I Be Nice To You? Coffee Shops
and the Politics of Good Service”
makes the case for the expectation of politeness from service
workers, as being counter intuitive,
both from the employer and the customer. Raine illustrates this
point by providing several
contradictions that exist in the modern management style of
large service-oriented businesses.
Her question of “Why should I be nice to you?”, is not put forth
so much as a question that she
attempts to answer affirmatively, but rather is the answer itself.
She aims chiefly to say that the reasons
for why she might be expected to be polite are all exceedingly
questionable.
Raine claims that the modern business model for large service-
oriented companies, namely
coffee shops, may often times work against itself. Many of the
large service-oriented chain companies
require politeness as a key element of the commodity known as
“good service". The same companies’
“layouts and management styles preclude much possibility of

7. creating warmth that this would entail.”
Once defined by the business owners, the “good service”
dictated by a business model defines
proper and improper modes of behavior. The modern business
model as dictated by the owners of
successful coffee shop chains has created an environment of
efficiency and specialization so maximized
that there is little time for sincere contact with the customer.
Raine claims that it in addition to time
restraints that disallow interaction with customers, the “dreary
and repetitive” nature of the work
“curtails interaction with the clientele”. Repetitive and fast-
paced interaction has led to assembly line
style requirements demanding the baristas attention and focus
be used to produce the physical product
being purchased with great specialization. This reality can
pressure the employee into a contracted
form of politeness, or even a non-existent form. Politeness
lacking may be perceived as rudeness,
counteracting the companies’ requirement for providing
politeness as part of the purchase price:
the contradiction.
The perception of experiencing “good service” requires not only
the physical product, but also
The expectation of servitude in the form of mandatory
politeness. The author cites the branding utilized
by companies such as Starbucks as professing to “guarantee”
“good service provided by employees
that are genuinely happy to give it.” Raine claims that the ideal
barista worker must conform to the
dictated mode of behavior, which in turn suppresses much of the
employees’ individuality, reducing
employee-customer interactions “to purely functional relations”,
and so, once again precluding any
expectation of prolonged politeness: a contradiction. It is

8. almost as if the proper barista is forced by job
description to be too hurriedly preoccupied to dispense with
sincere politeness. This business model is
well entrenched as it has been “inherited” from a tradition of
servitude that is centuries old, and that
society is comfortable with.
To throw a wrench in the awkwardness of corporate mandated,
guaranteed politeness with
every cup of coffee, the class distinctions mentioned by Raine
observe an interesting twist: the servers
are geared towards approximating the same class as the served.
This consideration works well to
support her overall tone in describing an illogical whirlwind of
questionable expectations.
Emily Raine’s purpose for writing this article is to illustrate
the contradictory relationship that
exists in the service industry’s expectation of polite employee-
customer interaction. She also
sympathizes with “Dissatisfied workers”, who”are stuck with
engaging tactics that will change nothing
but allow them to make the best of their lot”.
WEEK 3 ASSIGNMENTS AND NOTES: SUMMARY PAPER
IN THIS DOCUMENT I WILL DESCRIBE THE WEEK 3
ASSIGNMENTS. PLEASE READ THE ENTIRE DOCUMENT
BEFORE MOVING FORWARD WITH THIS WEEK’S
ASSIGNMENTS. YOU MIGHT PRINT THE DOCUMENT FOR
REFERENCE AS YOU WILL USE SEVERAL OF THE
COURSE TOOLS THIS WEEK.

9. In Week 3, you will take the outline you developed in Week 2
and write, revise, and submit the final
draft of your summary.
Your summary paper should be accurate, thorough, concise, and
coherent. This paper will be evaluated
on a 100 point scale using the standard paper grading criteria
listed on the syllabus. The final draft is
due on next Monday night. The final submission should be
typed double-spaced, include an appropriate
heading (the student essay on p. 104 shows the appropriate
MLA heading), and should be two to three
pages in length approximately.
Topic Assignment for the Summary paper
Write a 1-2 page summary of “Eat Food: Food Defined” by
Michael Pollan on pp. 425-431 in Writing: A
Guide.
In this assignment, you should strive to understand the author’s
main ideas and to present them in your
own words. Your essay should be thorough, including all the
main ideas from the original essay. In
addition, your summary should be concise, leaving out all the
repetition and most of the details and
examples in the original source. Also, your essay should be
coherent; connect sentences in a group that
reflects the relationships among the author’s ideas. Use your
marginal annotations and written
paraphrases to construct a summary of the entire source.
Key Features of a Summary

10. -statement of the article thesis.
mary of the main idea and key supporting points in the
article.
source.
your own opinions about the text)
ASSIGNMENTS FOR WEEK 3 (this week)
1. Begin by carefully reading this entire document.
2. Go to the Week 3 Learning module and review the following
supplemental materials. I have split
them into several sections to make them easier to read and to
help you zone in on one issue at a
time.
Summary.”
Plagiarism and Paraphrasing.”
Quotes.”
3. Using notes in the learning module about how to write a
summary, how to avoid plagiarism, and
how to paraphrase as well as the outline created above, write a
draft of your summary. See the

11. fifth document in the learning module, “Sample Summaries,”
for model summaries of the Raine
article we read as a sample last week.
4. Revise and edit your draft.
5. Optional Discussion Board posts. Although we do not have a
required discussion board posting
assignment this week, you many post your outline or draft to get
feedback from your peers
and/or your instructor. If you post your draft to get some
feedback, then you should also give
feedback to your peers—see p. 54 in Writing: A Guide for tips
about giving peer feedback.
a. If you want feedback from the instructor, you need to post the
draft by Friday evening.
Your instructor will provide you with a short paragraph of
global feedback about the
strengths and weaknesses of the draft, not correct all of the
errors or “fix” your paper.
See pp. 56-57 in Writing: A Guide for a discussion of how to
respond to instructor
comments.
b. Remember, posting a draft is optional, but getting feedback
from others is always a
good idea. If you post to get feedback, then give feedback to
others—it’s only fair to
do so!

12. 6. When you have finished the writing process summary paper,
submit it for evaluation.
a. Papers should be submitted using MLA style paper format.
Please see p. 626 in Writing:
A Guide for models of papers formatted in MLA paper style.
Please note that papers
should have 1” margins, be double-spaced, and use a
professional font (Times New
Roman, Arial, Calibri, etc). When submitting your documents
for final grading, please
save them as Microsoft Word documents (.doc) or rich text files
(.rtf).
b. Go to the Week 3 Learning Module and click on the Week 3:
Summary Final Draft
Submission. Attach the document you created and submit it
using the course
Assignment tool on this link. Please submit the outline and final
draft as a single
document, including your last name in the file name of the
document. This final draft
should be submitted no later than 11:59 pm on Monday. All
papers will be returned
within 7 days of submission (barring no unforeseen
circumstances).
c. If a student fails to submit the final draft on the assigned due
date, the paper will be
subject to the late work policies outlined on the syllabus.

13. Sample Summaries of Emily Raine’s “Why Should I Be Nice to
You”
Sample Summary 1
Most people at some point in their life have worked in the
service industry. This particular
industry can be quite satisfying whether it be working in fine
dining, as a cocktail waitress, or at a local
diner, but for Emily Raine, who had done all of these things, the
only place she ever felt “whipped” was
working as a barista at one of largest specialty coffee chains in
the world (358). Raine is bothered by
how the café industry has set up the impersonal server/customer
relationship and feels the best way to
solve the issue is be to “be rude” (365). In 2005, Raine
expanded in an essay that appeared in the
online journal, Bad Subjects, on her frustration within the
service industry and what good service really
means.
Good service in the coffee industry does not require much skill
these days. Most people are
usually talking on their cell phone while ordering their daily
coffee and pastry while also paying and then
out as fast as they walked into the café probably not even
noticing or acknowledging any interaction
with the people serving. The coffee sector has recognized this
and has set up the counters as linear
coffee bars that act the same as an assembly line. The workers

14. are trained and assigned specific jobs in
the coffee preparing process, such as taking the order, handling
the money, making the drink, to
delivery. This makes the interaction with the customer very
limited, mostly just seconds. This is where
Raine feels some of the problem with the customer and server
interaction. Although this is the most
effective and efficient way of working, Raine describes
productive work as “dreary and repetitive” (359).
Since the 1960’s companies have been branding themselves with
the quality of having “good
service” distinguishing them from the rest of the competition.
Raines explains that in good service there
is an exchange between two parties: “the ‘we’ that gladly serves
and the ‘you’ that happily receives,”
but also a third party, the boss, which is the ultimate decider on
exactly what good service will be (360).
Companies in the service industry must market their products on
servers’ friendliness; therefore
it is monitored and controlled from the people on top. Raine
notes that cafés “layouts and management
styles” help create a cozy atmosphere that plays a factor in good
service, but in a way that will not
disrupt the output (361). In Raine’s essay, she gives the
example of an employee Starbucks has
branded; “The happy, wholesome perfume-free barista” (361).
She points out that the company offers
workers stock options, health insurance, dental plans, as well as
other perks of discounts and giveaways,
while also using moving personal accounts from workers who
“never deemed corporate America could
care so much” (362). Raines also adds that the company does
not give into unionization and although
the company pays “nominally more” than minimum wage, the

15. shifts are scheduled oddly and never add
up to 40 hours (362). Starbucks has so much pride about having
the happy worker, but Raines suggests
that the workers are not all smiles.
Raine expresses her frustration with how the café industry is
run. She compares it to a “smooth
piece of machinery” and says she found that most people
“pretend they are interacting with and
appliance” (362). As she is very versed in the service world,
Raine claims that the customers are much
ruder to café staff than any other sector of the service industry.
The average barista worker is not hired as an individual, but
rather as another piece of the
whole puzzle to sell the image that the corporation advertises
and wants the customer to believe. Like
any other service job in America, there are standards in hygiene
and appearance in the work place. “The
company issues protocols for hair length, color and
maintenance, visible piercings and tattoos as well as
personal hygiene and acceptable odorific products,” writes
Raines, as well as a uniform to wear to show
they are staff and unify them as one (363). It seems reasonable
that a coffee shop would not want
baristas to wear strong odors as it would contradict the
atmosphere they are working so hard to provide
to each customer that walks though their doors. As Raine
states, these rules are not “alarming” and
have actually been in place for hundreds of years (363). This is
what helps make the distinction from
server and customer and makes the contact between them simply
functional. This division is vital to

16. good service because class distinctions cause notions of service
quality. Raine admits that good service
quality does not only mean serving well, but also to allow the
customer to feel good and okay about
being served, usually resulting in “one-sided politeness” (364).
Raine concludes by declaring that “There is no easy way to
serve without being a servant.” She
goes on to say that the best thing for her to do is to just show
her “actual emotions” rather than
practicing patience and good will and as a server she would
have an individual identity at work and
refuse class distinctions; she would be rude, not all the time,
but when she felt it necessary (365).
Sample Summary 2
In Emily Raine’s 2005 essay “Why Should I Be Nice To You?
Coffee Shops and the Politics of
Good Service,” posted in the online journal Bad Subjects,
readers are let into the darker side of coffee
shop hospitality. Raine reveals just how limited baristas are
when providing customer service. Specialty
coffee shops have created robot-like employees where
individuality can rarely be seen. Raine points out
the limitations of the workers and the amount of control from
management and the overall
corporation..
Raine begins by elaborating on the process of working at
Starbucks. Customers are shuffled
through a line watching an assembly line of workers prepare
different parts of their indulgence. Not
more than a few seconds are spent with each employee. This
limited time does not prove to be enough

17. to provide true friendly customer service. Each one only has
time for a smile before their task is
complete and the customer is shifted to the next step in the
process. In creating this process, Starbucks
has bred a new class of employees. The employees are just as
branded and marketed as much as the
coffee they sell. They make it very public about how well the
employees are treated with benefits that
many others in the industry do not offer. They even go as far as
referring to the employee as “partners”
that are genuine in their great customer service. Yet, there are
ways they get around it by never giving a
full forty hour work week, scheduling abnormal shifts, and
paying very little over what the standard
minimum wage is set at.
Starbucks next way of controlling the employee is by
regulating their appearance. Standards are
set for hair, acceptable smells to be worn, and any kind of
visual piercing or tattoo that one has. This is
to make the employees stand out as the ones who are serving.
This many times gives the feeling to the
customer that they are above the employee since they are being
served by a person in uniform.
Customers tend to be bothered if an employee asks anything
other than a question related to their
order or showing their personality. Starbucks also has policies
on what consumers can see employees
do. Workers are expected to enter and exit through back doors.
They are not allowed to eat or drink in
front of the consumers. These are all ways of setting the worker
aside from the consumer. It gives the
illusion that the consumer is in a class above the workers, “the
public only see them as workers, as
makers of quality coffee, and never as possible peers.” By
giving the feeling of the class distinction
customers feel it is justified to give orders, and give no respect.

18. These consumers do not think about
what the worker does on their personal time, or the fact that at
some point the worker is the customer.
Those who work in these kinds of places usually do not argue
the rules or fight the system in any
way. The jobs are not meant to be long term so they simply quit
and walk away. Raine felt better by
being rude to her customers. She provided this rudeness when
she felt the customer deserved a
comeback of some sort.
Sample Summary 3
Emily Raine’s “Why Should I Be Nice To You? Coffee Shops
and the Politics of Good Service”
makes the case for the expectation of politeness from service
workers, as being counter intuitive,
both from the employer and the customer. Raine illustrates this
point by providing several
contradictions that exist in the modern management style of
large service-oriented businesses.
Her question of “Why should I be nice to you?”, is not put forth
so much as a question that she
attempts to answer affirmatively, but rather is the answer itself.
She aims chiefly to say that the reasons
for why she might be expected to be polite are all exceedingly
questionable.
Raine claims that the modern business model for large service-
oriented companies, namely
coffee shops, may often times work against itself. Many of the
large service-oriented chain companies
require politeness as a key element of the commodity known as

19. “good service". The same companies’
“layouts and management styles preclude much possibility of
creating warmth that this would entail.”
Once defined by the business owners, the “good service”
dictated by a business model defines
proper and improper modes of behavior. The modern business
model as dictated by the owners of
successful coffee shop chains has created an environment of
efficiency and specialization so maximized
that there is little time for sincere contact with the customer.
Raine claims that it in addition to time
restraints that disallow interaction with customers, the “dreary
and repetitive” nature of the work
“curtails interaction with the clientele”. Repetitive and fast-
paced interaction has led to assembly line
style requirements demanding the baristas attention and focus
be used to produce the physical product
being purchased with great specialization. This reality can
pressure the employee into a contracted
form of politeness, or even a non-existent form. Politeness
lacking may be perceived as rudeness,
counteracting the companies’ requirement for providing
politeness as part of the purchase price:
the contradiction.
The perception of experiencing “good service” requires not only
the physical product, but also
The expectation of servitude in the form of mandatory
politeness. The author cites the branding utilized
by companies such as Starbucks as professing to “guarantee”
“good service provided by employees
that are genuinely happy to give it.” Raine claims that the ideal
barista worker must conform to the
dictated mode of behavior, which in turn suppresses much of the
employees’ individuality, reducing
employee-customer interactions “to purely functional relations”,

20. and so, once again precluding any
expectation of prolonged politeness: a contradiction. It is
almost as if the proper barista is forced by job
description to be too hurriedly preoccupied to dispense with
sincere politeness. This business model is
well entrenched as it has been “inherited” from a tradition of
servitude that is centuries old, and that
society is comfortable with.
To throw a wrench in the awkwardness of corporate mandated,
guaranteed politeness with
every cup of coffee, the class distinctions mentioned by Raine
observe an interesting twist: the servers
are geared towards approximating the same class as the served.
This consideration works well to
support her overall tone in describing an illogical whirlwind of
questionable expectations.
Emily Raine’s purpose for writing this article is to illustrate
the contradictory relationship that
exists in the service industry’s expectation of polite employee-
customer interaction. She also
sympathizes with “Dissatisfied workers”, who”are stuck with
engaging tactics that will change nothing
but allow them to make the best of their lot”.