Follow us:
DR. BICKMORE'S YA WEDNESDAY
  • Weekly Posts
  • WEEKEND PICKS 2023
  • Monday Motivators 2023
  • Weekend Picks 2021
  • Contributors
  • Bickmore's Posts
  • Lesley Roessing's Posts
  • Weekend Picks 2020
  • Weekend Picks 2019
  • Weekend Picks old
  • 2021 UNLV online Summit
  • UNLV online Summit 2020
  • 2019 Summit on Teaching YA
  • 2018 Summit
  • Contact
  • About
  • WEEKEND PICKS 2023

Registration is open for the virtual Summit on the Research and Teaching of Young Adult Literature!  Plan on April 21, 2023, 8:30-5:30 CST.  

Don't worry, it is easy to find.  Just go to YouTube and search for Dr. Bickmore's YA Wednesday.

Register here!

How Do We View and Represent Adolescents in Our Culture? by Steven T. Bickmore and Gretchen Rumohr

7/6/2021

0 Comments

 
During one of our 2021 Summit social hours, we put people into small groups and asked them to answer a common question. In one rotation we asked people to consider ways in which they thought that adolescence was portrayed in popular media, including YA literature, in either positive or negative ways. Unfortunately we found it much easier to find negative examples. Gretchen and I have continued to talk about this topic. 

Important to our discussion have been the contributions of a Youth Lens as put forward by Sarigianides, Petrone, and Lewis in Rethinking the "Adolescent" in Adolescent Literacy. If you are not familiar with this framework, it is one you should begin to consider as you read and consider the adolescent has presented in books, television, film and other narratives modes that present images of adolescents. In addition, Sarigianides, Petrone, and Lewis engage the topic of this framework in their free access article titled "How Re-thinking Adolescence Helps Re-Imagine the Teaching of English." They state:  "By ignoring society’s constructions of adolescence, teachers implicitly suggest to secondary students that dominant and mostly demeaning views of adolescence present true expectations for youth."  This leads us to wonder:  what have we encountered lately that as affirmed or challenged traditional conceptions of adolescence? We invite you to weigh in as well.rue expectations for youth. HT T "ow Re-thinking Adolescence Helps Re-imagine the Teaching of English
Sadie: A Novel by Courtney Summers

I think about Sadie as nearly a perfect realistic YA novel. It fits firmly in the tradition of realistic YA fiction that many of us cut our teeth on 20 to 30 years ago. The parents are absent; the challenges must be met by Sadie alone. 

The plot revolves around the disappearance and murder of Sadie's younger sister several years earlier. Now, at 19, Sadie is ready to seek out and punish the person she believe is responsible for her sister's death.  The author, Courtney Summers, borrows heavily from the format of the modern podcast. The story is placed, in part, as a portion of a podcast on missing girls.
Picture
The most important part of this novel is that Sadie is real. As I read the book, I felt that I knew her--that she could have been a student in one of my classes. Of course, she has her flaws as a human, but I felt the character was drawn honestly and not through a series of stereotypical assumptions about adolescence.  I might be wrong, but I think we need to keep seeking out strong characters who are not trivalized.
Freaks and Greeks

As I listened to the breakout sessions, I keep thinking about how unsatisfying the portrayal of teenagers tends to be in televison. It doesn't mean that I don't laugh from time to time, but I find the relationships, the plot, their emotions too overdrawn and sentimental. I just don't believe them. When I was a high school teacher and saw both Wayne's World and Fast Times At Ridgemont High, I was not entertained. The sources of the comic stereotypes were too real, too present in my actual classroom.  

I have often wondered if my students were trying so hard in many cases to live their lives according to the portraits they were constantly exposed to in and through a variety of sources.

Over the last four weeks I have tried to think of television shows that I might recommend as capturing the adolescences I witnessed as a teacher for 25 years and, now, as a teacher educator.  I am not quite ready to recommend it outright, but I am going to reinvestigate Freaks and Greeks. Maybe its brilliance is that it had such a short run.
Picture
Pen15 directed by Sam Zvibleman

Pen15 is described by Hulu as  "middle school as it really happened. Maya Erskine and Anna Konkle star in this adult comedy, playing versions of themselves as thirteen-year-old outcasts in the year 2000, surrounded by actual thirteen-year-olds, where the best day of your life can turn into your worst with the stroke of a gel pen."  Not only does this series entertain, its characters engage with serious issues:  bullying, divorce, consent, and substance abuse.  It is fascinating to see Maya and Anna, as adults, interacting with the much-younger cast, making us as viewers forget that they have already surpassed adolescence and its supposed challenges.  When watching, we can consider how each character represents adolescence, especially Anna and Maya: are they reliable adolescent narrators?  Do they poke too much fun at adolescent growth?  In what ways do they show the dedication, kindness, and creativity of all people, especially adolescents?  
Picture
 Apple: Skin to the Core by Eric Gansworth

In this multigenre memoir-in-verse, Gansworth describes himself in his youth as he dealt with disrespect of Native American culture, his language and heritage, his grandparents' boarding school experiences, his feelings of loss, his relationship with his father, and his decision to go to college. Perhaps it is Gansworth's honesty about how he felt in his youth that endears him so much to his readers--they can trust his recollections of adolescence.  With such honesty in mind, readers can take note of the many discoveries and decisions described by Gansworth, and marvel at the independent, creative, and dedicated adolescent depicted on the pages.  We can ask ourselves how Native American youth--and their various challenges and victories--are portrayed in YA literature.
Picture
Almost Famous directed by Cameron Crowe

My last selection is Almost Famous. I have often wondered if Crowe comes so close to accurate portrayals of adolescents because he began writing and observing as a teenager. He wrote the screenplay for Fast Times at Ridgemont High and then directed Say Anything and Singles--which could easily be considered New Adult if we use  Sharon Kane's criteria from last week's post.

What I find highly ironic about negative adult commentary on the appropriateness of such movies as Almost Famous and the others mentioned here as well as a host of other too numerous to catalogue is that these adults sound oblivious to their own experiences and somewhat ignorant of what their own teenagers  or their friends are experiencing.  
Picture
No, I am not saying that every kid is dying to be a rock and roll groupie or that every one is constantly drinking  or engaging in random casual sex. The truth is, however, is that some are. I think it is more important to consider why these portraits are so compelling. Why do we recognize, and abhor, aspects  of our younger selves? Why is it frustrating to acknowledge that teenagers make their own decisions about their bodies, their social lives, and their futures?  

What questions might we be asking to understand the current adolescent? My grandsons at 12 and 14  are certainly not experiencing adolescence in the same way I did. Oh sure, their desire to belong, have friends, explore their interests are similar, but the immediacy of social media is more present. I grew up in fairly good sized town, but we only had three tv channels and a local public station that I never watched. If I wanted to see something that was "taboo," I could, but it was probably a hunt. Well, things changes, yet they remain similar. Parents always want children to be better than they were, to persevere and "be good." We can ask ourselves: What do we expect of our children?  What do we expect of our students?  Do such expectations affirm our desires for "good" decisions as well as recognize the ways adolescents (and all people, for that matter) value independence, growth, and autonomy? As we continue to ask these questions, may we mirror the desires of Sarigianides, Lewis, and Petrone, who suggest that we "
bring attention to how we are involved in perpetuating or interrupting this process, and how we might re-imagine other possibilities, particularly for working alongside youth in English language arts classrooms."
Until next time.
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    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.

    Co-Edited Books

    Picture
    Meet
    Evangile Dufitumukiza!
    Evangile is a native of Kigali, Rwanda. He is a college student that Steve meet while working in Rwanda as a missionary. In fact, Evangile was one of the first people who translated his English into Kinyarwanda. 

    Steve recruited him to help promote Dr. Bickmore's YA Wednesday on Facebook, Twitter, and other social media while Steve is doing his mission work. 

    He helps Dr. Bickmore promote his academic books and sometimes send out emails in his behalf. 

    You will notice that while he speaks fluent English, it often does look like an "American" version of English. That is because it isn't. His English is heavily influence by British English and different versions of Eastern and Central African English that is prominent in his home country of Rwanda.

    Welcome Evangile into the YA Wednesday community as he learns about Young Adult Literature and all of the wild slang of American English vs the slang and language of the English he has mastered in his beautiful country of Rwanda.  

    While in Rwanda, Steve has learned that it is a poor English speaker who can only master one dialect and/or set of idioms in this complicated language.

    Archives

    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    June 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014

    Categories

    All
    Chris-lynch

    Blogs to Follow

    Ethical ELA
    nerdybookclub
    NCTE Blog
    yalsa.ala.org/blog/

    RSS Feed

Proudly powered by Weebly