Class Notes

By Katie Lynch

Thursday February 17th

Self Help: Continuing “The Secret” by Rhonda Byrne

 

We began class by trying to expand on the Universe of The Secret

The Professor shared her screen bringing up thesecret.tv:

While discussing it was brought to our attention that it was a franchise(something that has multiple expansions, products, etc that are connected and an extension of The Secret)

This self help franchise has Brother/Sister products that relate to it directly (For example: like when the Harry Potter Novels lead to Harry Potter World in Disney, Or those Hufflepuff pjs you may where).

The Professor explained that once a product or in this case a book becomes very popular or profitable, the creators and others involved will capitalize on that. In the case of The Secret you have other books from the series, books that have the same ideology, websites, a documentary, I mean the list goes on and on. Kind of like when people are selling something on Etsy and it has them put keywords so when someone searches those words they will come across their products.

As it pertains to the film, well Documentary, it dramatizes the ideas of The Secret which helps you to understand extreme positions of the content of the book.

We also found out that the Documentary actually came before the book, which is not something we are used to because it is in our experience the reverse: Book before the movie. From The Secret also came The Magic and The Power both by Rhonda Byrne.

We learned the definition of Ancillaries- meaning along side/adjunct to (related or coming from)

Products for Sale:

Books(Daphney)

Documentary(Erik)

App(Ryan)

Different logos (Daphney)

Website(Prof.Belli)

As the discussion progressed we started to discuss Theorist Steve Salerno who wrote SHAM: How Self Help Movement made America Helpless 

This brought up two different self help texts

Primary: which the example was a journal (Erik)

Secondary: which the example was a work written about it.

Prominent- well known/important

We then came to question #8 on our in-class worksheet, in which it was said a promise was given of how to accomplish the self help from the book for yourself.

This brought us to the covers of the book where we discussed how the front cover and the writing was how they used to write prior throughout history, making it seem old and worthy of us trusting it was able to do all it said it was.

Proving that the book is important from beginning to end we discussed the Epigraph(which is an inscription or in our case a quote at the beginning of the book) This quote is used to establish credibility/trust belief that the person will do what they promise.

Then the Professor ask:

If someone says they wrote a book about getting rich if they themselves are poor would you buy it?

I personally say no because it isn’t something they have so why would I put that trust in them. Now if it was a book that was written by someone who WAS poor but made their way to being rich, then yes I would.

Vocabulary:

Alchemy: a medieval chemical science and speculative philosophy aiming to achieve the transmutation of the base metals into gold, the discovery of a universal cure for disease, and the discovery of a means of indefinitely prolonging life.

example: “Thoughts becoming things” The law of attraction

Transmutation: take something less desirable and make it into something more desirable

Dubious: Questionable

Evoke: create the feeling of/Bring it to mind

Covetted: Form of desire. Desirability of it–Make others really really want it too (Olga)

 

TIPS OF THE DAY:

-Try to unmute and talk, the conversation in the chat can get missed at times

-Be on Camera/Be present

-Annotations: have specific page numbers in your post so it’s easier for everyone to follow and know where it is coming from

Announcements:

Kolani won People’s Choice!

George got a shout out from Professor Belli for having done a great job on specifics of text.

Reminder:

People’s Choice voting is NOT optional

FYI(For your information):

as it pertains to grades on posts….

Grades are private comments on your post, the public comments are given to help classmates

 

 

FOR NEXT CLASS:

READ + ANNOTATE: Self-Help; with Illustrations of Conduct and Perseverance (Samuel Smiles), 1859

 

*Read all front matter, Chapter I: Self-Help– National and Individual, Chapter IV: Application and Perseverance + one chapter of your own choosing (make sure to indicate in your annotations and blog which chapter you chose)