Texts:
“Bartleby, the Scrivener,” Herman Melville (fiction)
“Accepted,” Vanessa Hua (fiction)
“Surviving Usefulness,” Jenny Odell (nonfiction)
“The Work You Do, The Person You Are,” Toni Morrison (nonfiction)
“A Day in the Life of the Gen Z Worker,” by Alexandra Petri (nonfiction)
Question: In our culture, work tends to drive our identity and our sense of worth, but such a narrow focus can also damage our sense of self. For this paper, choose one of the two short stories, “Bartleby the Scrivener” or “Accepted,” and at least one of the nonfiction essays, “Surviving Usefulness,” “The Work You Do, The Person You Are" and/or “A Day in the Life of a Gen Z Worker” and one additional peer reviewed, scholarly source you find on your own to answer the following question: How important are professional pursuits to our identities and what is at risk when we prioritize work and professional status over our personal lives?
Please note: Scholarly sources MUST NOT be another scholar’s critical analysis of any of the texts. Write your own analyses of the texts.
Paper Specifications:
Papers should be 4-6 pages long, use MLA format, and include a works cited page.
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Search Terms
Gen Z work ethic
Gen Z professional identity
mental health in the workplace
quiet quitting mental health
quiet quitting professional identity