 | We welcome Roy Edward Jackson back to the YA Wednesday blog! In the past, Roy has written with Dr. Erinn Bentley. Today is Roy's first solo YA Wednesday post. Roy Edward Jackson holds degrees in Education, English, and Library Science. He has worked in public education in a variety of roles for over two decades. Currently, he is working on his doctoral research on the rise in LGBTQIA+ book challenges in school libraries. He resides in Pennsylvania with his husband and menagerie of pets. |
What's the Matter With YOU? by Roy Edward Jackson
If you decide to go outside and see what is happening turn to page 122...
For many, the first foray into second person point of view most likely occurred in a Choose Your Own Adventure book. One could be in the shoes of a track star or a zombie hunter upon turning to page 122. The book series has captivated young readers for generations. Many reluctant readers are hooked through the books that require the physical act of turning pages forward and backwards to progress the story, and the story changes each time one reads it by making different choices. But for some, the unconscious sliding into the shoes of others through second person point of view may have even more serious impact for the older YA reader. Second person POV is often described by adults as cold and distant. However, for the YA reader, second person can be quite the opposite.
For many, the first foray into second person point of view most likely occurred in a Choose Your Own Adventure book. One could be in the shoes of a track star or a zombie hunter upon turning to page 122. The book series has captivated young readers for generations. Many reluctant readers are hooked through the books that require the physical act of turning pages forward and backwards to progress the story, and the story changes each time one reads it by making different choices. But for some, the unconscious sliding into the shoes of others through second person point of view may have even more serious impact for the older YA reader. Second person POV is often described by adults as cold and distant. However, for the YA reader, second person can be quite the opposite.
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We know through Contact and Intergroup Contact Theory that the more interactions we have with people different than ourselves helps decrease the bullying and marginalization that occurs in society. For many students, the only contact with others vastly different from themselves may occur through literature. The second person POV brings the young reader into a closer connection with others than perhaps any other narrative. Being in the shoes of a character, or having the narrator speak to them through the word /you/, has a powerful emotional impact on the reader. There are various second person POVs that include reader as character, narrator speaking to reader, narrator speaking to other characters in the novel, and second person masking as first to cover trauma. Second person POV is a powerful tool regarding social emotional learning and building empathetic capacity. Novels like Two Boys Kissing, Damage, Booked, and 13 Reasons Why show the power that the word /you/ has in YA literature.
Two Boys Kissing by David Levithan is the story of Harry and Craig who set out to break the world record for longest kiss. Narrated by gay men of the past, the novel isn’t just a story of Queer kids today, but of the struggles from the past for gay, male Americans. The novel vacillates between various POVs but it is the second person POV that is the most powerful, especially for the reader who may not identify as LGBTQIA+. Levithan often uses the /you/ to give readers breathing space to ponder and consider as they are spoken to directly by the narrator. From the first page, the narrator is addressing all young readers. “You can’t know what it is like for us now-you will always be one step ahead,” (1). All kids can read this line and know that they are in a way one step ahead in all forms of progress than a narrator who was a teen in the 1980s. This writerly move to impact young readers continues to the last page. “There will come a time when the stars of your favorite teen TV show will be sixty. There will come a time when you will have the same unalienable rights as your straightest friends,” (195). While the first line clearly encompasses all young readers, it is the second that will engage the social emotional lens of the reader who is not Queer. They can pause, emphasize that while progress has occurred, Queer youth are still without equity. That their rights are still up for debate. This type of writing, addressing the reader through second person, impacts young readers in a most powerful way.
A.M. Jenkins’s young adult novel, Damage, is the story of Austin Reid who is sliding into a deep state of depression. A star football player in his small Texas town who dates one of the most popular and pretty girls in his school, Austin cannot seem to connect with anything or anyone around him. He suffers from depression and is coping through the trauma of his father’s death to cancer. His girlfriend’s father committed suicide and Austin has suicide ideation. Jenkins uses second person in the form of masking as first person. The narrator, Austin, is telling his story to himself. Telling himself the things he cannot face fully. He has stepped outside of himself to fully extrapolate his trauma. Because Austin is a football star, his girlfriend a cheerleader, they are the juxtaposition of the perfect outward life, and internal struggles of mental health and trauma. This allows the reader to slide into the shoes of the characters easier through the second person POV, and thus have a stronger understanding of the mental health struggles of others--particularly those who appear to have a perfect life outwardly, while struggling deeply inwardly.
Kwame Alexander’s young adult novel, Booked, centers around eighth grader Nick Hall. Nick, an African-American young man who would rather spend his time playing soccer than studying. He is particularly averse to reading, much to the dismay of his linguistic professor father. Alexander has crafted a voice so direct, and distant from his circumstances, that as a reader we literally are both the /you/ as addressee and protagonist. There is a clear reason that Alexander chose the second person, and that is because Nick is going through compounded trauma. At the surface level he is in competition with his white best friend and starting to find his first romance more complicated by racial bullying. Deeper below the surface he is watching his family crumble through divorce and feeling abandoned by his mother. He cannot face these compounded trauma’s face on, in first person, so he has chosen to tell his story in the second person as if it’s not fully happening to him. The second person POV, along with a novel written in verse, allow readers of all races to relate to Nick. Young readers will relate to the trauma of divorce regardless of their own experiences with it. In addition, for young readers in predominantly white schools, Booked gives them a window to the experiences of racial bullying through the use of second person in a more connected way.
13 Reasons Why by Jay Asher has been one of the most talked about YA novels in the last decade and a half. As new generations discover the book, it will continue to capture young readers. The novel’s, and author’s personal controversies aside, it merits mention in an examination of the power of second person POV in YA books. Asher’s protagonist, Hannah, speaks from the grave to the other characters in the book, as well as to the readers. Hannah’s suicide, and the implications to the characters she sends her tapes to, have serious impact on the young reader. That great impact comes from the use of the /you/ in the novel. While Hannah tells each recipient how they marginalized and hurt her, the young reader of the novel steps into interesting shoes. They do not step into Hannah’s, rather the reader steps into the victimizers’ shoes and receive how their harmful behavior hurt Hannah. Readers are not empathizing with those that hurt others, rather they come to terms with how they, through the characters in the book, can harm and cause pain to others. It is a powerful place to receive how our behavior hurt others, and that is the precise power of the use of second person in 13 Reasons Why.
Many adult readers find second person point of view difficult to read. They often struggle with how to read, or receive, the use of the word /you/. But with each new generation comes new ways of reading. As more and more kids are taught social emotional learning and social justice, the way they read changes. That makes the power of second person POV in YA books all the more useful. Teaching kids to read with the ability to empathize with the marginalized, those that are hurting, or are othered, is a powerful tool in social emotional learning, and young readers find connections to others they may not have typical contact with in their daily lives through books. These books show how the use of second person can make that connection even deeper as it can force readers to become the /you/ they are reading in literature.
Many adult readers find second person point of view difficult to read. They often struggle with how to read, or receive, the use of the word /you/. But with each new generation comes new ways of reading. As more and more kids are taught social emotional learning and social justice, the way they read changes. That makes the power of second person POV in YA books all the more useful. Teaching kids to read with the ability to empathize with the marginalized, those that are hurting, or are othered, is a powerful tool in social emotional learning, and young readers find connections to others they may not have typical contact with in their daily lives through books. These books show how the use of second person can make that connection even deeper as it can force readers to become the /you/ they are reading in literature.
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