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Halloween through Both Old and New YA Texts by June Pulliam

10/27/2021

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June Pulliam is my primary go to source for scary stories. For over a decade I have been in awe of June's knowledge of the basic horror genre. In fact, this goes beyond YA books and into film and other stories about ghosts, werewolves, and other monsters. Indeed her knowledge is a bit, well-- terrifying.  

June has other posts for Dr. Bickmore's YA Wednesday. Browse through the contributors' page and pay special attention for her name during the month of October.

​Thanks June.

Halloween through Both Old and New YA Texts

​by June Pulliam

My picks for this Halloween are two works of YA fiction—Ryan Douglass’s first novel The Taking of Jake Livingston and an Amazon reboot of Lois Duncan’s I Know What You Did Last Summer franchise. Both offer different interpretations of haunting. Douglass’ The Taking of Jake Livingston easily fits into this category. Ever since he can remember, Jake Livingston has been a medium.  However, Jake turns away from his gift because it genuinely frightens him, and he doesn’t Jake doesn’t need anything else to make his peers think that he is strange: Jake is one of the few gay kids of color at the all-boys high school he attends, and he is closeted even to his family.

The Taking of Jake Livingston is notable in how it thwarts common tropes of ghost fiction, where men and women have different experiences with spirits. For cis het white men, haunting is a threat to their masculinity, which is based on being in control of their bodies (and frequently the bodies of others). Haunting for these protagonists is more like demonic possession that can only be resolved by evicting the spectral interloper threatening their autonomy. For example, the male protagonist in Joe Hill’s novel Heart Shaped Box must banish the ghost that is trying to kill him.  Or the parapsychologist Dr. Montague in Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House, who arrogantly believes that ghosts cannot physically harm the living, stands corrected after Eleanor kills herself under the influence of the house’s spirits. In Richard Matheson’s A Stir of Echoes, Tom Wallace loses his bodily autonomy after being hypnotized by his sister-in-law: Tom is left vulnerable to the spirit world, and to regain control of his body, as well as the women in his life, he must locate the ghost’s corpse to put together the final, official narrative of her as a demanding and promiscuous woman in life. This narrative both gives the ghost the justice she desires while also banishing her to the afterlife. 
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Because Jake Livingston is neither cis, nor het, nor white, his experience with haunting is comparable to how women are more typically mediums for spirits in ghost fiction. Mediumship is compatible with normative femininity in how channeling spirits is similar to pregnancy—the medium typically allows the spirit to use her body to get the justice he or she was denied in life. Jake’s body is taken over by ghost of Sawyer Doon, a boy his own age who gained notoriety a year earlier when he went on a shooting rampage and killed several of his classmates. Sawyer, as angry in death as he was in life, hijacks Jake’s body to continue his killing spree beyond the grave. Jake can only be a passive observer as Sawyer’s spirit uses his body to murder an uncle who raped him. Jake can only regain control of his body by developing empathy for the deeply unsympathetic Sawyer, which Jake does by embracing his abilities as a medium. When Sawyer possesses Jake’s body, Jake has access to Sawyer’s consciousness and learns that Sawyer too was gay, brutalized by his father and ignored by his mother in life. Once Jake understands the source of Sawyer’s anger, he uses more masculine strategies to exorcise the vengeful spirit—Jake engages in an ethereal battle with Sawyer, ultimately banishing him to the world of the dead. The experience allows Jake to feel like a complete person, someone who is secure enough to come out to his mother and brother (who are both supportive) and start dating his first crush.

​Amazon’s reboot of Lois Duncan’s I Know What You Did Last Summer franchise is a close cousin to the ghost story: the series is more about haunting than Lois Duncan’s original novel or Jim Gillespie’s 1997 film version, which have more in common with the slasher genre. The story’s basic premise is a group intoxicated teens drive home from a party and hit someone walking in the road. When the teens see the unmoving victim in the roadside brush, they assume the person is dead. Because the teens are afraid of going to jail for vehicular manslaughter, they drive away and agree to never speak of the incident again. A year later, however, the four must come to terms with their cowardice when a stranger contacts each to tell them “I know what you did last summer.” Afterwards, the teens are killed one by one. 
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​Amazon has expanded and updated Duncan’s cast of characters: they are racially and sexually diverse and come from different classes. Meanwhile, the ubiquity of cell phones and security cameras in our world transforms Duncan’s 1973 tale from one about a stalker who is unrealistically good at surveilling his victims to a more believable story about the perils of living in a world where everyone can be watched through everyday technologies. The left-for-dead stalker of the Amazon series can spoof phone numbers to send threatening texts and hack phones and to leak people’s sex tapes to social media, quickly turning friends against each other when no one can be sure of who anyone really is. The stalker’s ability to use these technologies is akin to haunting in how it reveals secrets that the living would prefer to keep to themselves.  Too, in an age of mechanical reproduction, authenticity is no longer possible. This last idea is emphasized by the relationship between the person left-for-dead and the car’s driver, twin sisters Lennon and Allison respectively. At her father’s suggestion, Allison pretends to be her dead sister Lennon because Lennon was more likeable and above suspicion than her sister. Soon, Allison is no longer sure which sister she really is.
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Instead of asking us to suspend disbelief, both of these narratives ask us to consider haunting in a new light. Ghosts aren’t so much abject Others as they are manifestations of ourselves.
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June Pulliam
Louisiana State University

​June Pulliam is a Distinguished Instructor who regularly teaches courses about slasher films, zombie fiction and film, and Young Adult fiction. She is the author of numerous books and articles on these subjects as well as a book about punk rock. Pulliam is also a self-taught painter who occasionally sells some of her work, an animal rescuer, and an old house enthusiast.
Until next week.
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Around the World in a Dozen YA Novels:Windows, Mirrors, and Doors that Show the Trials, Tribulations, and Hope of Teens in Challenging Circumstances by Marshal George

10/20/2021

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For many years now, I have been running important ideas past Marshall George. Not only is he a YA literature expert trained by the legendary Ted Hipple, he has also be thoroughly involved English education through NCTE. He was the chair of ELATE quite a few years ago when it was still CEE. 

Over and over again our conversations prove to be rewarding.  In addition, Marshall is a regular contributor to Dr. Bickmore's YA Wednesday. It is worth your time to browse through the contributors' page to find some of this other posts.

Around the World in a Dozen YA Novels: Windows, Mirrors, and Doors that Show the Trials, Tribulations, and Hope  of Teens in Challenging Circumstances

​Marshall George

Anyone who knows me at all or has seen my Facebook page knows that international travel is my passion. Since first leaving the United States for Brazil at the age of eleven, I have found untold joy in exploring our world, learning about other cultures, and spending time in other countries. Someone once asked me if I had any hobbies. After some thought, I responded, “travelling.” The follow up question was, “what else?” My response, “planning trips.” While this love of travel and my fascination with other cultures was strong when I was in middle and high school, I do not recall having the opportunity to read much about the rest of the world back then (though I do know that I learned that Constantinople was the old name for Istanbul from one of the Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, or the Bobbsey Twins). It is no wonder that when I have the opportunity to read works of YA literature now, I often gravitate towards novels set around the world. Some are set in places I have visited, others in exotic places that are on my bucket list. However, much of my reading over the past several years has focused on young adult novels set in places around the world where the people face unbelievable challenges, hardships, strife, and misery. 

Much has been written about the metaphors of literature as windows, mirrors, and sliding glass doors. (I love this brief description of the idea from its originator, Dr. Rudine Sims Bishop). In a nutshell, the idea is that books provide readers with opportunities to see aspects of themselves, their lives, and their experiences (mirrors), to see and learn about the lives and experiences of others (windows), and to feel as if they are stepping into the actual setting (sliding glass doors) that is far removed from their own contexts. Many of us believe that a rich diversity of literature providing all three of these types of opportunities is crucial for all children, adolescents, and young adults.

​The following books are some of the best YA novels that I have read over the last five or six years that are set in far-flung places around the world-places that I had little prior knowledge of before reading these books; places that have incredible natural beauty, fascinating cultures, and extraordinary suffering and hardship. As a middle-aged adult reading young adult literature, I am still regularly able to see aspects of characters that allow me to look in the mirror; however, it is the opportunity to look through windows and walk through sliding glass doors to learn about the lives of people who live in very different places from where I live and travel that brings me the most satisfaction. I highly recommend each of these books to young people, to those who work with young people, and to those who just want to know more about this crazy world in which we live. 

Manila, Philippines
Patron Saint of Nothing (Randy Ribay 2019, YA)
Jay Reguero, whose mom is white and dad is Filipino, is not sure that he is ready for college. When he learns that his cousin has died in the Philippines, Jay is upset. When he learns that his cousin was shot by the police as part of Philippine President Duertete’s war on drugs, Jay becomes angry about the corrupt murders in that country and convinces his parents to let him travel to the country where he was born. There he stays with his police chief uncle and his family. During his several weeks in Manilla, Jay seeks to uncover the truth about his cousin’s murder. In that quest he learns a great deal about the culture, the history, and the current political situation in his native land. He also learns some painful truths about his own family. Readers of this book, too, will learn much about Filipino culture, recent history, and the current state of affairs in this fascinating country.
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Chennai, India
The Bridge Home (Padma Venkatramen (2019, MG)
Life in the streets of Chennai is dangerous and harsh for Viji and her sister, Rukku. The young sisters have run away from a violent homelife in a small village, finding shelter on an abandoned bridge in the huge city. When they befriend two other young people who are forced to live on the streets, the sisters form a new family and figure out how to survive on their own, scavenging for food and things to sell in the city dump, and making money by making bead necklaces to sell. After fleeing from their shelter at the bridge when their safety is jeopardized, the sisters and their friends relocate their tent in a graveyard, where monsoons and mosquitos lead to extreme illness for the young girls. Eventually, the kindness of an older woman leads to change and for the first time a glimmer of hope. Readers will gain insight into the plight of poor and homeless children in the developing world, but will also learn that those poor and homeless children have love, dreams, and sometimes beat the odds. 
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Yangon (Rangoon), Burma (Myanmar)
Bamboo People ( Mitali Perkins 2010)
Chiko, a teenage Burmese boy, lies in his nation’s capital city. Because he can read and write in both English and Burmese, he is excited to read of a teaching opportunity he might have. But his excitement is curtailed when his mother reminds him that at any time he could be arrested by a government agent or the police like his father was for resisting the government. When Chiko goes to apply for the position, he discovers that it is a ruse to lure young men as recruits for the army. He is taken to a military recruitment center, which is more like a prison. Indeed, he is beaten and punished mercilessly at the training camp. On a mission for the army, Chiko is badly injured in the jungle by a hidden landmine. There, he is found by Tu Reh, a sixteen-year-old Karenni boy who is fighting against the Burmese army that Chiko is being forced to fight for. Rather than killing Chiko, his sworn enemy, Tu Reh decides to take him to his own camp where he can get medical attention for his badly injured leg. Chiko and Tu Reh become friends before going their separate ways to rejoin the fight on opposing sides of the war. Readers are likely to recognize the elements of an unlikely friendship between two teenagers on opposite sides of a conflict, while also learning about a civil war they likely have never heard about.
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Raqqua, Syria and Istanbul, Turkey
The Land of Permanent Goodbyes (Atia Abawi 2018)
The civil war in Syria has been raging for years and has led to an unthinkable number of deaths and refugees. Tareq lives with his loving family in war-torn Syria, but his happy life is changed forever by the bombing of his neighborhood, when he loses some of his beloved family members and is trapped under the rubble of his apartment building. Once he is out of the hospital, Tareq and his father flee to Raqqa, a once lush city that has been decimated by drought and war. In Raqqa, they discover what life is like under the oppressive Daesh, known to most Americans as ISIS. Tareq and his father must continue their flight, seeking refuge first in Turkey, where refugees are not treated very well. Determined to head for Europe, Tareq finds himself alone in a leaky boat with fake life jackets bound for Greece. Readers will walk through the sliding glass door to learn of the horrors of the Syrian civil war and the refugee crisis it has caused and will begin to understand what life has been like in that part of the world for many years. ​
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Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
Driving by Starlight (Anat Deracine 2018, YA)
Leena lives with her mother in Riyadh. Her father is in prison for having protested against the government. Her best friend, Mishail, is the daughter of a high ranking government official. In an act of defiance, the girls hatch a plan to defy the dress code for women and wear colorful revealing western-style dresses for their senior photos. Leena also has to sometimes dress as a man in order to accompany her mother when she goes shopping (since her husband is not able to do so, being in prison). In another act of defiance, Leena learns to drive a car, taught by a group of rebel friends and practicing every night in the desert. Leena also begins studying law on her own, despite not being able to get written permission from her father to do so. Readers will learn about the oppressive lives of young women in Saudi Arabia, and just how different their lives are from those of young men there. While most western readers will look through the window to catch a glimpse of a life very different from their own, they will also see reminders of the importance of friendship and family that mirrors their own experiences.  
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Mirpur Khas, Pakistan and Jodhpur, India
The Night Diary (Veera Hiranandani 2018)
Twelve-year-old Nisha lives with her twin brother, her grandfather, and her grandmother in India in 1947 prior to the partition of India into two countries, India and Pakistan. Prior to the partition, town citizens of the Hindu, Muslim, and Sikh faiths all lived together. The partition leads to tension, unrest, violence, and turmoil in the town, now located in Pakistan. One of Nisha’s parents is Hindu, and the other Muslim, so her life is especially confusing and dangerous-- so much so that she and her brother must quit attending school. Realizing that the situation is only getting worse, Nisha and her family attempt to relocate to “New India,” where people of the Hindu faith can hopefully live in safety. Their harrowing journey leads to danger and heartache, but they finally arrive in Jodhpur, where the family attempts to build a new life. Readers of this historical fiction will learn about the impact of the creation of Pakistan and will be able to glance at the experiences of oppressed people who become refugees in their own country, but do gain a new found freedom when they survive the challenges they face. Again, the complexities of family relationships may seem familiar to readers, even though their contexts may be quite different from those of Nisha and her family. 
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Tehran, Iran
Darius the Great is Not Okay (Adib Khorram 2018)
Half American and half Persian, eighteen-year-old Darius does not feel like he fully belongs in either culture. When his parents find out that his grandmother is dying in Iran, they decide to take the family to the country where his mother was born and raised. When he first arrives in Iran, Darius feels even more ostracized than he did at home in the USA. However, during his time in Iran, Darius makes a good friend, explores the beauty of the culture, and becomes enamored with the country and begins to feel a sense of belonging like he had never felt before. Many readers may see themselves as they read about Darius’ struggles with depression and with coming to terms with his identities. The book also provides a view of the fascinating Persian culture of Iran.
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Hazarajat, Afghanistan  
The Secret Sky (Atia Abawi 2014)
Fatima lives in a small rural village with her family in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. Almost a woman, Fatima is forbidden from leaving her home alone, and there are many restrictions about what she can do. Nevertheless, Fatima begins a secret and quite dangerous relationship with her close childhood friend, Samiullah, who is Pashtun. The relationship is discovered by Samiullah’s cousin, a zealot, who exposes the young couple. Their families are furious and Fatima is severely beaten. The couple decides to flee to Kabul, where they think they can be to together and where Fatima’s dreams of attending college, something that women are also forbidden to do under Taliban rule, might come to fruition. Readers can discover the unthinkable world of Taliban-controlled Afghanistan and may come to understand two very different versions of Islam. Embedded in all of the horror and sadness, however, is a tender love story, something many readers will understand.  
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Ciudad Juárez, Mexico
Disappeared (Francisco Stork 2017)
Sarah and her brother Emiliano live in Ciudad Juarez, a Mexican city just south of the border with the United States. Sarah’s father is working in the US and suddenly decides to divorce her mother, leaving the family in financial straits. Sarah, who works for the local newspaper, writes a regular column about the desaparecidas, or women who are kidnapped and missing. This includes her best friend, who was kidnapped on her way home from work one evening. Her columns get the attention of someone, who threatens her and her family if she continues to publish it. Upon investigation, Sarah believes the threats are coming from within the police department. The book also chronicles the experiences of Emiliano, who is in love with the daughter of a wealthy businessman, and who propositions him to begin smuggling drugs into the US. This novel introduces readers to two major societal issues: drug trafficking and human trafficking and the violence associated with each of them. Sarah and Emiliano have major ethical and potentially life-altering decisions to make, something most readers can identify with. ​
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Rural Cote d’Ivoire, Africa
The Bitter Side of Sweet (Tara Sullivan 2016)
Fifteen year old Amadou and his eight year old brother Seydou are child laborers working on a cacao plantation in the Ivory Coast. When they took the work, they and their families thought it would be for a year, providing money the family desperately needed. However, they became forced laborers, greatly abused by their overseers. When a young girl is brought to the farm camp, clearly against her will, Amadou and Seydou’s treatment becomes even more brutal when they try to befriend and help her. When Seydou is severely injured in a machete accident, Amadou knows they must escape if they are to stay alive. The novel ends with a hopeful tone, with Amadou being able to share the horrors he and the other trafficked children have faced. Sullivan opens the door for readers to learn about the cacao/chocolate trade works and how it has long depended on kidnapped children to keep it alive.
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Jungle of Congo, West Africa
Endangered (Eliot Schrefer, 2012)
Fourteen-year-old Sophie is a biracial girl who lives in the Congo her mother. Her mother creates a sanctuary for bonobos and refuses to leave Africa when her husband gets a job in the United States. Sophie returns to the US with her father and spends summers in Congo with her mother. In an attempt to save an injured bonobo, Otto, who is being sold by a questionable man, she inadvertently contributes to the burgeoning bonobo black market. She tries to nurse the injured creature back to health prior to returning to Miami. When war breaks out, and the military arrive at the sanctuary, Sophie finds herself alone at the sanctuary and has to make a daring escape with Otto. She spends months hiding, traveling, and trying to dodge the war around her. She is eventually reunited with her mother and decides to finish her schooling in the Congo. Readers look through the windows and learn about bonobos, the war in Congo, and a remarkable relationship between a human and an ape.
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Marshall George is the Olshan Professor of Clinical Practice at Hunter College-City University of New York. He has been an English education professor for 25 years. Prior to that, he taught middle and high school English language arts for 10 years. ​
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Until next time.
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“Stalking Boybands was Serious Business”:  YAL, TikTok, and the “Girlfan” by Angela Insenga

10/13/2021

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It is time for your "Young Adult Literature to popular culture" connection! Angela Insenga is steeped in all kinds of connections between popular culture--music, television, film, documentary, and so many social media sharing formats. Every time I read something Angela writes I am amazed by her ability to make all of these connections. Her assignments are amazing and I often wonder if I could pull off some of them in my class--but it doesn't stop me from trying every once in awhile. 

Angela has been a frequent and productive contributor to Dr. Bickmore's YA Wednesday. To find a few more of her posts just browse through the Contributor's Page. Thanks Angela.

“Stalking Boybands was Serious Business”:  YAL, TikTok, and the “Girlfan”

by Angela Insenga

​In the era of “Devious Licks,” it may well be anathema to think about bringing anything related to TikTok into the classroom. And, with study of social media informing us of its addictive and purported degenerative powers, using it could raise hackles. However, I’m pairing Goldy Moldavsky’s novel Kill the Boyband with the documentary This is Us, which tells the "rags to riches" Algerian tale of the British-Irish sensation One Direction and is slickly directed by Morgan Spurlock. And then, instead of asking my students to turn in one more end-of-unit essay, I am asking my students to study TikTok creations within the real 1D fandom, gather data on how the one-minute chunks of film are put together and by whom, and come to conclusions about the (mostly) girlfans they encounter.  
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In Goldy Moldavsky’s darkly humorous and satirical Kill the Boyband, the members of The Ruperts, each named Rupert, originally auditioned alone on So You Think the British Don’t Have Talent?,  each imagining a solo career in the music business. But all the boys were eliminated from competition. However, the boyband is born when the host looks out into the audience, sees myriad signs featuring the name “Rupert,”  and quips, “Seems like the Ruperts are getting a lot of love tonight!” At this moment, “a million lightbulbs went on over the heads of music execs,” and the boys were rockets into space, destined for stardom and inevitable commodification, their personalities narrowly and heteronormatively defined for millions of those who had only seen their tryout videos. Where there are boy band members, fangirls follow.  
The unnamed narrator of the novel defines and self-identifies as a new breed of fangirl, noting: 

It wasn’t enough anymore to send them fan mail and kiss the posters above our                                      
beds….you weren’t a true fan until you engaged in Twitter death threats and endless                               
stan wars [where fangirls]. . . .[wielded] Sharpies like weapons [and passed] the time by                                
discussing ambush tactics. . . [with another] Ruperts fangirl [whose] friendship [with                                  
other fans also] lived and breathed primarily in Twitter DMs and text messages.
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In short, we learn from the ensemble of female protagonists, “just how important the internet was in all of [their] lives.” A virtue of the internet is that it can connect groups of likeminded individuals who spur each other onward, enrich each other’s lives, and share common obsessions. This virtue is also social’s vice, with which we contend daily. But why focus only on the decline when there are also positive results?
​The action in Kill the Boyband takes place on a single night at the “swankiest hotel in SoHo,” the Rondack. Superfans Erin, Isabel, Apple, and our unnamed narrator book a room here, right where The Ruperts are staying before performing their sold-out half-hour special, “Coming to America: The Ruperts Learn about Thanksgiving!” Instead of freezing outside at the barricades the city set up—though being a “barricade girl” is quite a feat, I have come to understand—the girls go inside, where the chances of running into a Rupert increase dramatically.  In their quest, they end up accidentally kidnapping Rupert Pierpont, the least-adored “ginger” Rupert whose only redeeming quality is that he can juggle. What follows is part comedy of errors, part searing critique of the music industry, and an examination of a weirdly maligned group: girls who stan bands.
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If any of the book’s details sound familiar, you may have lived through the 2010s, when British-Irish boyband One Direction ruled pop music. After Simon Cowell plucked each solo boy from the group that did not make the cut on the British talent show The X Factor, their popularity soared. And even though they came in third place as a band, within five years, by 2020, the band sold an astonishing 70 million records worldwide. In their five-year run, 1D won seven Brit Awards, seven American Music Awards, five Billboard Music Awards, five Billboard Touring Awards, and four MTV Video Music Awards. Most importantly, the band won a record of 28 Teen Choice Awards after being nominated 31 times. By 2015, it was hard to turn a page, stand in a grocery checkout lane, walk through a school supplies section, a mall, peruse toothbrushes or teach an adolescent without seeing one of—if not all—of the boys’ faces.  And when I tell my students that 1D was bigger than The Beatles, they balk.  But they traveled to and performed in more countries and cities, expanding their fanbase and its rate of consumption, and they had the power of social media: YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Vine.  
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It is at the juncture of Moldavsky’s critique of the music industry and the fangirl figure, the culture that so harshly dismisses fangirls them as “crazy,” and One Direction’s enduring fanbase that now resides largely online where my students and I are now situated. We moved from the fiction of the novel to the heavily mediated image of One Direction in This is Us to “real” fans on TikTok who, even now, are churning out intricately crafted videos or putting up slapdash ones because they are upset, excited, or angry. 
After studying Moldavsky’s fictional representation of The Ruperts stans—called the “Strepurs”—we move into the thriving niche of TikTok where Directioners dwell, making and remaking artistic chunks of film dedicated to One Direction or to one of the members. I ask my students to think about the critique of the music industry and fans in the novel as they begin to methodically examine TikToks organized under assigned hashtags (e.g., “#Nialler” for Niall Horan, “#Narry” for those who ship Harry and Niall, etc.). Using criteria I’ve suggested; in particular, I focus on the “rhetoric” of TikTok, on trends, and on ways in which recombinant TikToks critique or seek to answer others. Considering the purported fickle nature of teen girls, the 1D portion of TikTok bursts with energy and optimism, depression and exhilaration, and longing and having.  All of this, even though the band went on hiatus over six years ago. 
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I chose this learning pathway for my students with hopes that they could further understand how social media in the hands of a dedicated fandom works and how foregrounding specific TikTok trends from girlfan creators leads us to complicate the rather prejudicial trope of the “crazy fangirl,” much like Moldavsky explodes the concept in her novel. TikTok, I hope to show them, is a (de)generative space, wherein a multitude of communities governed by hashtags exist. In these hyperreal groups, adolescents repeatedly demonstrate higher order thinking as they create videos using the platform’s mechanics—filters, voiceovers, snippets from films, and soundtracks. Each TikTok about 1D is added to an ever-widening web of texts that produce syncretic and longitudinal knowledge about the fandom and the object(s) of its affection. While TikTok allows for endless recombinant chunks of film, the trends also bear out that trends arise. For example, enduring beliefs that two members of the band dated, showcase the band’s time in the spotlight, (re)imagine a reunion, and artistically advertise every scintilla of news about the boys’ now flourishing solo careers. But there is more than recapitulation of adoration, the boys’ own contracted social media appearances, or concert footage. 
In their TikToks, girlfans of 1D are often philanthropists, raising money through a 5k or donating to charities favored by the members of the band. They are increasingly comfortable living in ambiguities, adapting happily to others’ chosen pronouns, sexual identities, and gender expressions. They create pointed, critical messages to other public people like Candace Owen, who in 2020 attempted to blast Harry Styles for wearing a dress as the first man to appear on the cover of Vogue, pleading with him and America to “Bring back manly men.” Fans profess Harry Styles' “Treat People with Kindness” mantra and mean it, as comment threads and monies to charities on his birthday evince. They profess that the friendships they’ve made with other fans mean more than anything to them--even more than the band itself. They also, in teary posts, sometimes leave the Neverland they’ve half-lived, half-created.  They go to college, get engaged, have children. And their social accounts, left as a kind of momento mori to their own girlhood, remain. 
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In my YA class, then, study and discussion of Moldavsky’s satire in Kill the Boyband has become a conduit for study of real girls in a real fandom. In absence of 1D concerts and in a plague year wherein all members of One Direction canceled solo gigs, TikTok is, more than ever, a bastion for expression in a world that does not sanction the exhibition of female desire or hysteria. A girl falling to her knees when Niall Horan surprises her at a candy shop in Disneyland or a “Louie” claiming that he is “the actual sun” in her life is seen as unbalanced, while boys losing their minds over football, screaming at umpires ‘calls in the sixth inning, or being loud, obnoxious, or angry is seen as typical, even expected. On TikTok, girls who are fans are seen. They are heard. And that, it turns out, is the point. 1D TikTokkers, just like the young women in Moldavsky’s texts are super fans. They scream. They snipe. They love. They obsess. And, in the mix, I am finding, is their creation for our study, for our understanding of how YAL and social media connect, how both can be a place for authentic expression.
Until next time.
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The Finalist for the National Book Award in Young People's Literature

10/6/2021

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One Note Before We Start

Dr. Bickmore's YA Wednesday is building a team of curators and social media specialists.

Check out this link for more information.

2022 National Book Award Finalist for Young Peoples Literature

Ok, for somebody who has paid attention the the National Book Award, for nearly two decades, this is a tough confession. I was blanked by the list of finalist. I ... have ... not ... read ... a ... single ... one, YET! Yes, that right. I now have a new task. Some years I have read most of the long list. Many years I have the bulk of the finalist. Give all of that, some of my favorite years have been books that didn't move into the finals or that didn't win. For example I loved We are Not Free and Apple: Skin to the Core in 2020.

In 2019 what is not to love about Patron Saints of Nothing or Look Both Ways. 2018 brought us a fabulous winner with The Poet X and the finalist included The Journey of Little Charlie and Hey, Kiddo, not to mention Blood Water Paint, Boots on the Ground, and We'll Fly Away as part of the longlist. The 2017 list is amazing with several books that I still teach and write about-- What Girls are Made Of, American Street, The Hate U Give, Long Way Down, I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter and You Bring the Distant Near. I have probably failed to mention somebody's favorite book from the award lists during the last four years. Sorry, that just goes to speak to the quality and the diversity of the choices. I must say that the diversity and representation of authors and communities has certainly increased since we discussed and documented the first 20 years of the award.  

Let's take a look at my new "to be read" list and some of the resources I have gathered. (All of the  titles below are linked to the books page within the National Book Award website. It also has links to more information about the books author.)

The Legend of Auntie Po

Kirkus Review The Legend of Auntie Po

Common Sense Media The Legend of Auntie Po

School Library Journal Review The Legend of Auntie Po

The Horn Book Review The Legend of Auntie Po

Comics Beat Review The Legend of Auntie Po

Lesbrary Review The Legend of Auntie Po

Publishers Weekly Review The Legend of Auntie Po

Muse Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books The Legend of Auntie Po
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Last Night at the Telegraph Club

KIrkus Review of Last Night at the Telegraph Club

Rainbow Round Table Book and Media Reviews  Last Night at the Telegraph Club

School Library Journal Review of Last Night at the Telegraph Club

Utopia State of Mind Review of Last Night at the Telegraph Club

Lesbrary Review of Last Night at the Telegraph Club

The Lesbian Review Last Night at the Telegraph Club

Publishers Weekly Review of Last Night at the Telegraph Club
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Too Bright to See

The New York Times Review of Too Bright to See

Kirkus Review of Too Bright to See

Shelf-awareness.com review of Too Bright to See

Publishers Weekly Review of Too Bright to See

Falling Letters Review of Too Bright to See

Mombian Review of Too Bright to See

Muse Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books Review of Too Bright to See
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Revolution in Out Time: The Black Panther Party's Promise to the People

revolutioninourtime.com 

​Kirkus Review of the Revolution in Our Time

Publishers Weekly of Revolution in Our Time

School Library Journal Review of Revolution in Our Time

Zinn Education Project Review of Revolution in Our Time

Teaching Books Revolution in Our Time
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Me (Moth)

NPR book review of Me (Moth)

Publishers Weekly review of Me (Moth)

WeWriteatDawn.com review of Me (Moth)

Koosreviews.com review of Me (Moth)

Diversebooks.org Q&A with Amber McBride
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Until next time.
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Celebrating Latin American and Hispanic Heritage Month with a Critical Lens By Alex Torres

10/4/2021

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Dr. Bickmore's YA Wednesday Monday Motivator #2

One of the great things about working with YA Wednesday is that I get to connect with former students. Alex was a joy to have in class and it is even more exciting to see what she is up to. I love her advice in this post. It is a perfect post for our Monday Motivator. A Monday Motivator provides some information that a teacher can put into action right away or share with their students without a lot of preparation. Thanks Alex for wonderful collection of easy to use resources.

Celebrating Latin American and Hispanic Heritage Month with a Critical Lens
By Alex Torres

Last week I was asked to read Mango, Abuela, and Me by Meg Mediana to a kindergarten class. The well-meaning event coordinator opened the reading with, “It’s National Hispanic Heritage Month! Who likes tacos? Who likes quesadillas?”. I flinched a little at the vast diversity of Latin American culture with our varied music, rich traditions, current struggles, and complex history to be reduced to two foods.  
 
During this heritage month, I often find myself flinching. Flinching at the way the month is celebrated with little to no nuance on Latin American heritage and the performative allyship that will dwindle come October 16. I find myself flinching because Latinx/Hispanic culture gets conflated with Mexican culture. One small example is finding decorations and even images for flyers that are inclusive of all the Latin American countries that are not Mexican-centric is hard. 
​Yes, I am Mexican, and I love my roots. But if I am frustrated with the microaggressions of being asked “Do you speak Mexican?” or “Where are you really from?”, I can only imagine how much more frustrated my Nicaraguan, Honduran, Paraguayan, Ecuadorian, Puerto Rican, Columbian, Venezuelan, Costa Rican, Peruvian, Brazilian, Chilean, Argentinian, Bolivian, Uruguayan, Panamanian, Salvadorean, Guatemalan, Cuban, Dominican, and all other Latin American siblings are to be called “Mexican” in a derogatory tone. It must be extra frustrating to already be an underrepresented group and then the focus during a heritage month misrepresents your heritage through being eclipsed by a misconception that Mexican culture is the only Latinx culture. 
In terms of representation for Latinx YA novels, I am hopeful that we are turning from a Mexican-centric Latinx representation and focusing on the diversity of Latin America. When I was growing up Brown in Mississippi, Esperanza Rising by Pam Muñoz Ryan was the first and only middle-grade book where I could see myself represented, especially as a Mexican immigrant. Later, a YA book that I appreciated was Gabi, a Girl in Pieces by Isabel Quintero where the honest tone especially about cultural shaming around weight helped me reflect on my own body image issues. Although I did not read Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Sáenz until in my twenties, I was elated to see my queerness represented within my Latinx culture. I could only imagine what it would have meant to have more access to Latinx queer stories when I was a teen. I am elated to see the growth of Latinx LGBTQ+ representation. 
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​Latinx YA have expanded outside Mexican characters. For example there are books like A Cuban Girl’s Guide to Tea and Tomorrow by Laura Taylor Namey or Never Look Back by Lilliam Rivera which centers Puerto Rican characters. Poet X and Clap When You Land both by Elizabeth Acevedo, focus on Dominican characters. Lobizona by Romina Garber centers on a undocumented Argentinian immigrant and We Are Not From Here by Jenny Torres Sanchez features Guatemalan teens crossing the border which follow a much-needed new wave of timely undocumented Latinx stories.
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While there has been some expansion to representing more Latin American heritages, I still do not think we have expanded enough to encompass representation from the 33+ countries and territories that make up Latin America. We need a continued and more balanced diverse representation within the Latinx YA novels.
 
Nuanced and diverse representation matters. And yes, we should all help celebrate this month, but we should celebrate with critical consideration.
 
First, please celebrate this month with nuance. 
 
This month recognizes all those who have Latin American roots. If you only associate this month with tacos, margaritas, sugar skulls, tokenizing the Brown folk in your school/workplace, and lumping everyone as "Mexican," you are missing out on the diversity of the 33+ countries and territories that make up this population. Honor the diversity and educate yourself more about the individual countries.

Here are some recommendations on documentaries, podcasts, and books:

DOCUMENTARIES
Latino Americans, PBS
Paper Children (Niño de papel), YouTube
The Graduates/Los Graduados, PBS
Harvest of Empire: The Untold Story of Latinos in America, Onyx Films
Dolores, PBS
Underwater Dreams, 50 Eggs

PODCASTS
Latinos Who Lunch 
Latinx Therapy 
Scattered, NPR 
Latina to Latina 
Latino USA, NPR 
Con Todo
 
BOOKS
Finding Latinx by Paola Ramos. 
Undocumented by Dan-el Padilla Peralta. 
The African American and Latinx History of America by Paul Ortiz.
Salsa, Soul, and Spirit: Leadership for a Multicultural Age by Juana Bordas
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Second, please celebrate this month by checking your biases and making an effort to avoid microaggressions. 
 
Because we are so diverse and have a complicated history of colonization, there's no one word that really encompasses us as a group. Some people prefer the term Hispanic, others Latinx, Latino/a and even Latine. Here are some short readings on these terms. https://www.highlightsfoundation.org/19965/hispanic-or-latinx-how-evolving-language-impacts-kids/?fbclid=IwAR1S-Cz4ckQ2EZAHZ8RML_LFkb13Hi6JdjFrVLac_0IWBQdESZbrvBfhadU
 
And 
https://www.chicagoreporter.com/whats-liberating-not-limiting-about-using-the-term-latinx/ Don't assume what people identify as. Always ask what they prefer. 
Third, please celebrate this month with a critical lens and critical solidarity. 
 
Educate yourself on the systemic struggles and see where you may be able to help. Latinas/Hispanic women have the lowest wages. The Latinx population has the least amount of college degrees. Latinx immigrants provide the country with farming, construction, housekeeping, and other essential labor and many of those workers don't have access to healthcare, driving licenses, or stable housing. And don't get me started on language access. Let us also not forget the many brown kids who are still in cages. 
 
So how can you help?
1. Volunteer or donate to your local organizations who serve Latinx populations.
2.Find out if your city has a 287(g) and find ways you could help end them to help reduce racial profiling in your area.
3.Visit Unitedwedream.org for more info on how to help undocumented youth.
4.Support Latinx-owned businesses.
5. Ask your school board members what they are doing to increase language access and help Hispanic/Latinx student feel included.
6. Ask congress to stop using tax money for detention centers 
 
This list is not exhaustive. But it's a start. 
 
And of course, keep reading the diverse Latinx YA stories that can serve as windows or mirrors. Here’s a few YA Latinx Books I can’t wait to read.
 
Dark and Deepest Red by Anna-Marie McLemore 
Cemetery Boys by Aiden Thomas
Woven in Moonlight by Isabel Ibañez
Each of Us a Desert by Mark Oshiro
Sanctuary by Paola Mendoza and Abby Sher
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Happy Latin American and Hispanic Heritage Month
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Dr. Alex Torres is the Assistant Director for Latinx Affairs at Louisiana State University where she provides resources, advocacy, and leadership development to amplify opportunities for Latinx students. Alex has over ten years of experience working with underserved students and with implementing culturally sustaining and healing-centered educational approaches. Her dissertation “Documenting Desire: Addressing the Educational Needs of Undocumented English Learners” won the James Olney Distinguished Dissertation Award. She has engaged in community advocacy for immigrant youth in the Baton Rouge area since 2015. You can email her at alex.torres.writes@gmail.com or follow her on IG @dr.alex_torres
Until next time.
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    Dr. Gretchen Rumohr
    Chief Curator
    Gretchen Rumohr is a professor of English and department chair at Aquinas College, where she teaches writing and language arts methods.   She is also a Co-Director of the UNLV Summit on the Research and Teaching of Young Adult Literature. She lives with her four girls and a five-pound Yorkshire Terrier in west Michigan.

    Dr. Steve Bickmore
    ​Creator and Curator

    Dr. Bickmore is a Professor of English Education at UNLV. He is a scholar of Young Adult Literature and past editor of The ALAN Review and a past president of ALAN. He is a available for speaking engagements at schools, conferences, book festivals, and parent organizations. More information can be found on the Contact page and the About page.

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