Voicing Identity: the Dilemma of Narrative Perspective in Twenty-first Century Young Adult Fiction

2014 ◽  
pp. 251-267 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria Nikolajeva
Keyword(s):  
Young Adult ◽  
First Century ◽  
Young Adult Fiction ◽  
Narrative Perspective ◽  
Twenty First Century

Manufacturing Manhood: Young Adult Fiction and Masculinity(ies) in the Twenty-First Century

2020 ◽  
pp. 109-122
Author(s):  
Tom Jesse ◽  
Heidi Jones
Keyword(s):  
Young Adult ◽  
Critical Literacy ◽  
Gender Norms ◽  
First Century ◽  
Young Adult Fiction ◽  
Twenty First Century

This chapter examines representations of masculinity in contemporary young adult fiction and identifies four major trends within the genre. These trends suggest a recent shift in YA texts away from traditional gender binaries and toward a more open, fluid understanding of what it means to “be a man” in the twenty-first century. The chapter concludes with a set of recommendations for dealing with these changing gender norms in today’s classrooms by adopting a critical literacy stance when helping students read and discuss these texts.

New Adult Fiction

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jodi McAlister
Keyword(s):  
Young Adult ◽  
Social Factors ◽  
First Century ◽  
Young Adult Fiction ◽  
Literary Marketplace ◽  
Twenty First Century

The term 'new adult' was coined in 2009 by St Martin's Press, when they sought submissions for a contest for 'fiction similar to YA that can be published and marketed as adult – a sort of 'older YA' or 'new adult'.' However, the literary category that later emerged bore less resemblance to young adult fiction and instead became a sub-genre of another major popular genre: romance. This Element uses new adult fiction as a case study to explore how genres develop in the twenty-first-century literary marketplace. It traces new adult's evolution through three key stages in order to demonstrate the fluidity that characterises contemporary genres. It argues for greater consideration of paratextual factors in studies of genre. Using a genre worlds approach, it contends that in order to productively examine genre, we must consider industrial and social factors as well as texts.

Contemporary Werewolves

2019 ◽  
pp. 144-158
Author(s):  
Kaja Franck ◽  
Sam George
Keyword(s):  
Young Adult ◽  
Identity Politics ◽  
First Century ◽  
The Other ◽  
Young Adult Fiction ◽  
Nature And Culture ◽  
The Media ◽  
Twenty First Century ◽  
Positive Representations

Twenty-first-century werewolves (following vampires) have become humanised, as identity politics have become mainstream and the Other assimilated. Young Adult fiction and paranormal romance have proved to be where the most radical transformations of the theme have occurred. Two other, related, strands are to be found: ecology has shaped our understanding of creatures which oscillate between nature and culture, and the Ecogothic has generated more positive representations of hybridity and animality. There are now werewolf hauntings and sightings, and a revival of folkloric elements which posit the new werewolf as the spectre wolf. This chapter charts these recent shifts and manifestations. The focus throughout is on literature and contemporary urban myths involving werewolves in the media but similar incarnations of the new werewolf in film, TV, videogames and comics are also acknowledged.

scholarly journals Millennial Readers: An Analysis of Young Adult Escapism

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marina Demetriou
Keyword(s):  
Young Adult ◽  
Generation Y ◽  
Cultural Landscape ◽  
First Century ◽  
Student Debt ◽  
The Social ◽  
Generational Identity ◽  
Twenty First Century ◽  
American Society ◽  
Social And Cultural Factors

[Introduction] Millennial Readers: An Analysis of Young Adult Escapism The emphasis on the generational identity of American millennials and their portrayal in the current cultural landscape of the twenty-first century furthers the idea that millennials are exhibiting escapist tendencies by engaging themselves as a majority (fifty-five percent) of young adult readership (“New Study”). Born within 1981 and 1996, millennials (also known as Generation Y) are defined, as those that are—for reasons such as student debt, cost of living, and the financial crisis—delaying typical milestones of adulthood like obtaining a degree, securing a career, purchasing a house, and starting a family. This examination of the social and cultural factors that have affected twenty-first century American society exposes how authors have navigated a world increasingly defined by evolving identity, displacement, discrimination, and a generational lack of agency for the age-diverse young adult market. These themes—including Black Lives Matter, socio-economic hardships, and totalitarian power—have been written with younger audiences in mind, as authors attempt to mimic societal pitfalls within literature in an approachable narrative. The regression of adulthood and millennial priorities have evolved the young adult genre over the last twenty years (since the first millennials became adults), and as a result, they have generationally transitioned into a redefined version of adulthood that requires an escapist outlet.

Young adult literature in translation: The state of research

2019 ◽  
pp. 179-194
Author(s):  
Kaja Makowska
Keyword(s):  
Young Adult ◽  
Young Adult Literature ◽  
The State ◽  
Code Switching ◽  
First Century ◽  
Circulation Rate ◽  
Young Adult Fiction ◽  
State Of Research ◽  
Characteristic Style ◽  
Youth Language

The aim of the article is to examine the concept of young adult literature, provide its historical timeframe, identify its key components, and, finally, discuss young adult literature in translation by presenting the state of research on the topic. After analysing the concept of a young adult, the article moves on to provide a brief summary of adolescent fiction’s history, concluding that J. D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye and S. E. Hinton’s The Outsiders largely contributed to the recognition of the genre. The paper mentions characteristic style choices employed by the authors of young adult fiction, the most prominent being the blend of registers or ‘code-switching’ between teen and adult speech, as acknowledged by Penelope Eckert and Chuck Wendig. Code-switching constitutes one of the main translation problems and is discussed at large in two compelling papers on the topic of young adult literature translation, namely Translating Young Adult Literature. The High Circulation Rate of Youth Language and Other Related Translation Problems in “The Catcher in the Rye” and “The Outsiders” by Saskia Tempert and Translating Young Adult Literature: Problems and Strategies. John Green`s “An Abundance of Katherines” by Loana Griguta. Both dissertations analyse the language of adolescent novels (in the twentieth and the twenty first century) and devise a list of strategies dedicated to adequately rendering English source versions into Dutch and Romanian, respectively. These writings indicate a growing interest in the field of young adult literature translation. The article expresses the hope that more scholars will elaborate on the topic.

Reflecting Realities in Twenty-First-Century Irish Children's and Young Adult Literature

2020 ◽  
Vol 50 (1) ◽  
pp. 131-142
Author(s):  
Patricia Kennon
Keyword(s):  
Young Adult ◽  
Power Systems ◽  
First Century ◽  
Gothic Literature ◽  
Irish Society ◽  
Celtic Tiger ◽  
Social Transformations ◽  
Twenty First Century ◽  
Systemic Violence ◽  
Youth Literature

This article explores the evolution of Irish youth literature over the last four decades and these texts' engagement with cultural, political, and social transformations in Irish society. The adult desire to protect young people's ‘innocence’ from topics and experiences deemed dark or deviant tended to dominate late twentieth-century Irish youth literature. However, the turn of the millennium witnessed a growing capacity and willingness for Irish children's and young-adult authors to problematize hegemonic power systems, address social injustices, and present unsentimental, empowering narratives of youth agency. Post-Celtic Tiger youth writing by Irish women has advocated for the complexity of Irish girlhoods while Irish Gothic literature for teenagers has disrupted complacent narratives of Irish society in its anatomy of systemic violence, trauma, and adolescent girls' embodiment. Although queer identities and sexualities have been increasingly recognised and represented, Irish youth literature has yet to confront histories and practices of White privilege in past and present Irish culture and to inclusively represent the diverse, intersectional realities, identities, and experiences of twenty-first-century Irish youth.

scholarly journals The Economy of Attention and the Novel

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sibylle Baumbach
Keyword(s):  
High Impact ◽  
First Century ◽  
Attention Deficits ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Night Time ◽  
New Approaches ◽  
Narrative Perspective ◽  
White Tiger ◽  
Twenty First Century

Many twenty-first-century novels have reacted to the changing economies of attention as well as to increasing anxieties about inattention and attention deficits. These ‘attention novels’ do not only include multiple shifts in narrative perspective, fragmented styles, and an aggregation of high-impact stimuli to bind readers’ attentional capacities: They also develop a multi-layered poetics of attention, which resonates with the politics of attention conducted by, for instance, the literary prize economy, and the increasing desire for fascination in a media-saturated age. Focussing on Aravind Adiga’s The White Tiger (2008) and Mark Haddon’s The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time (2003), this chapter explores the ways in which twenty-first-century novels relate to discourses on attention and attention deficits and introduces new approaches for analysing ‘attention narratives.’

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