Self-Help Literature (ENG 3402: Topics in Literature)
Professor Belli–Spring 2021–City Tech
For this week’s People’s Choice, you’ll be reading class blogs on your individual research of Self-Help Critiques and choosing your favorite post.
Comment here to register your vote, & don’t forget to include the name of your classmate, the link to their post, and your rationale for choosing it. Due Thursday, 4/22 by 9am. Happy reading/voting
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My People’s Choice goes to Anil for his post titled, “Finding yourself.”
https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/belli-sp2021-eng3402/2021/04/20/self-help-critiques-2/
I chose his post because I really admire the topic he chose to research and write about. As stated by Anil, “Who are you? I feel this question comes up alot when dealing with anything. It can come up when terrible things happen, or good things happen. In my personal experience, that question comes up when you are trying to figure out what you are truly destined for. I personally believe before you are born you are destined for something, and throughout your life, you work things out, create new things, even try out new things just to figure out what it is. When I say “things” mean situations, goals to make for yourself to figure out what you like vs don’t.” In this quote, I liked how he mentioned his personal experience in his topic, along with the articles he wrote about that displays finding yourself in it.
My People’s Choice this week goes to Courtney.
https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/belli-sp2021-eng3402/2021/04/20/schizophrenia-lost-in-a-world-of-mindfulness/#respond
I chose this post because it’s a topic that’s new to me and it’s never even occurred to me that meditation can negatively affect anyone, let alone someone with schizophrenia. Even with her presentation I like how she told us what schizophrenia is at the very beginning and the rest of her slides were very informative/ insightful. I also like how she related it to someone else in her life and read an excerpt from her friend’s book in order to fully understand this topic.
I vote for Anil because I like his topic “ finding yourself.” However, I do feel like it is “out of range” because we were supposed to find articles that critique self-help. Moreover, he is missing to include the links to his 3 articles. Nevertheless, I wanted to vote for him to encourage him for his future blogs.
https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/belli-sp2021-eng3402/2021/04/20/self-help-critiques-2/#respond
My choice for people’s choice goes to Aryanna.
https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/belli-sp2021-eng3402/2021/04/20/does-self-help-self-inadequacy/
She did something I couldn’t do myself and that is find articles she enjoyed. I’m not sure where she went to find articles that she found so interesting but I was trying to do that and couldn’t even find articles that related to the main topic of my response. With every article she doesn’t just explain what is being discussed which is what I do, she explains it in a way where it feels personal and it feels more than just an explanation, it feels like a genuine response. She says this about one of the articles “I really enjoyed this article because it had a “real” feeling to it. I feel as though a lot of concepts in the genre of self-help can almost feel “magical” and unobtainable, and this article discusses the same feeling”.
My vote for people’s choice goes to Courtney
https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/belli-sp2021-eng3402/2021/04/20/schizophrenia-lost-in-a-world-of-mindfulness/#respond
I chose this post because her topic was very like different because I would’ve never thought of doing that. She explained in detail what schizophrenia was and how it relates to meditation. I learned new things after hearing her presentation.
My vote for this weeks peoples choice goes to Ajah. I choose her because I think her topic is similar to mine. I think her articles and idea is pretty great. She also did a good job of explaining.
https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/belli-sp2021-eng3402/2021/04/20/1164/
My vote goes to Maria this week!
https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/belli-sp2021-eng3402/2021/04/20/improving-or-worsening-ourselves-with-self-help-merchandise/
This week my vote is for Maria because she has an interesting title. She also has an attention grabber in the form of a question at the beginning of her blog so it gets you thinking as you read. I also liked how she intergraded her own thoughts and life with the author’s opinions.
My people’s choice this week goes to Courtney. https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/belli-sp2021-eng3402/2021/04/20/schizophrenia-lost-in-a-world-of-mindfulness/
I’m choosing Courtney’s because I’m interested in hearing more information about how meditation could cause a negative decline on someone’s mental healthy . I love how specific her topic of Schizophrenia is, it makes her blog very clear and readable.
Congrats to Courtney for being chosen as this week’s People’s Choice (and to Anil for being a close runner-up)!