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Ashley Glambin

Professor William Reader

ENG 111

22 November 2022

Personal Growth in Life

In ENG 111, there were three anchor readings we were assigned. The first is

titled “The Politics of Remediation” by Mike Rose. To summarize, this reading is

about Rose investigating different students and their issues in school. The first

student was Marita who was struggling with a creative writing assignment

because all she knew how to do was quote the encyclopedia and was taught by

her father to only speak when she knew something. The next student was Lucia,

she was a mom and she was struggling with a passage because it was not

agreeing with her beliefs. Then there was James, he also struggled with writing as

he had been taught a summary is good enough for an essay.

The next writing was “Transformative Learning: Theory to practice” by Jack

Mezirow. A quick summary would be that it is about the transformation theory in

adult learning. It also explains the relationship between transformative learning

and autonomous responsible thinking. It also touches on implications for adult

educators.

The last and final anchor reading was “Cosmopolitanism” by Kwame Anthony

Appiah. This was an interview with Appiah and is about the different world we live
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in now. He talks about cosmopolitanism as an old concept, but it is still very much

valid in today's world. Each of these writings talks about several different topics,

but one thing they all talk about is learning, bettering yourself, and growing as a

person. A common theme among these three readings is personal growth.

Personal growth can be defined as “activities that develop a person's capabilities

and potential, build human capital, facilitate employability, and enhance the

quality of life and the realization of dreams and aspirations” (Wikipedia). The three

anchor readings talk about personal growth mentally and emotionally but differ in

the ways of mental and emotional growth.

Firstly, the three anchor readings all discuss mental growth. In the first anchor

reading, Rose touches on the mental growth of college students, “They need

opportunities to talk about what they’re learning: to test their ideas, reveal their

assumptions, talk through the places where new knowledge clashes with ingrained

belief” (43). While he doesn't specifically mention growth it can be inferred that

giving students, and people in general a chance to talk through and test ideas, will

lead to mental growth. Mezirow also talks about mental growth, not just for college

students, but for everyone, “Jürgen Habermas (1981) has helped us to understand

that problem-solving and learning may be instrumental-learning to manipulate or

control the environment or other people to enhance efficacy in improving

performance; impressionistic- learning to enhance one's impression on others, to

present oneself; normative- learning oriented to common values and a normative

sense of entitlement…” (6). Growing mentally means that you're learning, and when
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people learn new things, it improves the person mentally. Referring back to the

definition of growth this fits perfectly, as it is discussing activities that one can do

to grow and have a better quality of life. Appiah also discusses mental growth but

not directly when he says:

“One kind of person who is open to strangers, open to the world, accepting

in a way that abandons all judgment—that perspective produces a kind of

cultural relativism in which you say, ‘Whatever they want to do, that's fine,

and I'm interested in it, I'm curious about it; I have a cosmopolitan curiosity

about it. I'm willing to talk to them about it but there's no place for me,

standing outside, to make any judgments, any moral judgments, any ethical

judgments about what they're up to’”(25).

While Appiah doesn’t directly talk about growth, this can be geared towards

mental development, as it takes mental growth to become this type of person.

When someone opens themselves to the world and begins accepting people for

who they are and is able to understand that everyone is different, it will better their

life as a whole.

While they all talk about mental growth, they also discuss emotional growth.

Appiah discusses emotions which are a part of emotional growth:

“We're just expressing our desires, our passions, our emotions, and, as a

result, values are kind of "in the heads" of different people and, since people

are different, values are different. That leads pretty quickly to a sort of

relativism according to which there are no extrapersonal standards of

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judgment, and therefore no conversation can be had about these things as

there's no standard of judgment that we both feel bound by or responsible

to” (31).

Many people struggle with expressing and feeling their emotions, as they feel

judged or may judge others when they do. It takes emotional growth to be able to

express and accept emotions which will better a person's quality of life as they

won't feel the need to mask their feelings or feel the need to judge others. Rose

also gives examples of emotional growth, as a student he worked with was letting

her feelings and beliefs get in the way of her learning. “Lucia's working-class

Catholicism made it difficult for her to go along with, to intellectually toy with, the

comparison of Freud to God, but there was another problem here too, not unlike

the problem she had with the "sign-using" passage” (35). Once Rose worked with

her, she experienced emotional growth, as she was able to see from another point

of view and appreciate the writing even though it didn’t go along with her beliefs.

This is important because a lot of people need to grow emotionally and be able to

accept things even if it doesn’t go along with their belief system. Mezirow also

talks about emotional problems that can lead to growth, as he says:

“An example of a habit of mind is ethnocentrism, the predisposition to

regard others outside one's own group as inferior. A resulting point of view is

the complex of feelings, beliefs, judgments, and attitudes we have regarding

specific individuals or groups (for example, homosexuals, welfare recipients,

people of color, or women)” (6).

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Mezirow connects with both Rose and Appiah as they all agree that people's

beliefs and feelings can lead to judgment but people are able to grow emotionally

and become better. Both Appiah and Mezirow are talking about the habit of

judgement, in which they both feel people tend to judge others without reason.

They are also all talking about feelings, and how people tend to feel a certain way

based on their beliefs, which doesn’t allow them to be open. These are all issues

that can be assisted with people reflecting on themselves and growing mentally.

Furthermore, this topic is very important to me because I feel there is always

room for improvement for not only myself but for everyone. Mental health is

something that is very important to me and a part of mental health is growing. I

chose mental and emotional growth because it is anyone can do. This means a lot

to me as I want to grow mentally and emotionally and the examples that all three

anchor readings have really made me look and reflect on myself and made me

realize where I may need to improve.

The connections throughout the three anchor readings are very important

because they show that there are people talking about the need for mental and

emotional growth in the world. They have enlightened me to be able to accept my

and others' feelings, not judge people for what they do, and not let my personal

beliefs get in the way of accepting other people's views. These anchor readings

connections will help me in my education to allow me to open myself to other

people and the material that is given, they will help in my career as a teacher there

will be students from all different backgrounds and I will have to accept them for
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who they are and lastly, they will help me in my life entirely to become a good

person and better myself.

To conclude, these writers are all discussing a very important topic of the

problems in the world such as judgment, allowing beliefs to get in the way of

education, relationships, not feeling or allowing others' feelings to be, and many

other topics. While these issues may never be completely resolved, they could be

helped by people beginning to grow and evolve mentally and emotionally, so that

they can be open to change and help to make the world a better place.
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Works Cited

"Kwame Anthony Appiah: Cosmopolitanism," From Astra Taylor (ed.).

Examined Life: Excursions with Contemporary Thinkers. New York: The New Press,

2009.

Mezirow, Jack. “Transformative Learning: Theory to Practice.” New

Directions for Adult and Continuing Education, no. 74, 1997, pp. 5-12.

Rose, Mike “The Politics of Remediation.” Exploring Connections: Learning in

the 21st Century. Pearson, 2016, pp. 99-124

Wikipedia contributors. "Personal development." Wikipedia, The Free

Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 19 Nov. 2022. Web. 7 Dec. 2022.