Taylor McGloin
812
Reading
Response
A book that I have been reading and have
chosen to write my response on is "Looking for Alaska" by John Green.
During ELA we were all asked to come up with a critical thinking question and I
chose "How does this book make you think more deeply about issues that are
important to you?" And as I continued to read I elaborated on this idea
and all the social issues encountered in the book.
One huge social issue in "Looking for
Alaska" is underage drinking and drug use which occurs a lot in the book.
That kind of stuff is not as common in middle school, as it is in college but
this made me look in and think more about the consequences emotionally,
physically, health wise etc. Alaska was very clueless when it came to thinking
about all these substances and their effects on people. As I looked into it I
realized more deeply how harmful underage drinking and drugs can be,
considering the thought. had never really occurred before. "Out of control
not looking back at it" says Alaska when high showing how out of control
and crazy things can actually get.
Another social issue I looked into and started
"thinking more deeply about" was Teen suicide/self harm, In this book
Alaska was very depressed about her life and life in general. To cope with her
problems she would cut her wrists and cut her thighs and as it built up more
and more she finally made the decision to kill herself. Teen suicide and self
harm is something very common in society right now. As I read this I also
looked into the social issue bullying and learned more about it and studying
this also made me think more about these kind of events in any situation.
Seeing Alaska struggle when she says " I can't continue to do this day to
day" made me want to study more about it.
In conclusion "Looking
for Alaska" made me think deeper about social issues like abusing
substances, underage drinking, bullying, depression, self harm and teen
suicide. As I looked into it I learned a lot more about the effects of
different situations.
