Que(e)rying Youth Suicide: Sexism, Racism, and Violence in Skim and 13 Reasons Why

This paper troubles positivist and pathological discourses surrounding youth suicide through critical engagement with young adult fiction: Skim and 13 Reasons Why. These texts offer opportunities for readers to dwell on and question youth suicide prevention and intervention through an engagement with affect, gender, queerness, and race. Skim (2008, Groundwood) and 13 Reasons Why (2017) counter ‘it gets better’ stories: they interrogate the inevitability of bullying, question the predictable approaches that schools take in their response to violence, and assert that the issue at hand is more systematic. Together, these analytics que(e)ry youth suicide by asking: how does the biopolitics (or necropolitics) of livability fit into popularized understandings of youth suicide? Read together, Skim and 13 Reasons Why provide opportunities to meaningfully question livability through the characters of Skim and Courtney—two Asian girls who bear the brunt of racist and sexist violence. Skim becomes a ‘project’ of white girls’ anti-suicide campaign and Courtney is barely living as she attempts to secure the plaform of ‘model minority.’ Both girls are queer, too. In its entirety, this paper arguse that popularized models of suicide intervention continue to ignore the pressing needs of queer Asian girls—such as Skim and Courtney.

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Effectiveness of Australian youth suicide prevention initiatives

The British Journal of Psychiatry ◽

10.1192/bjp.bp.111.093856 ◽

2011 ◽

Vol 199 (5) ◽

pp. 423-429 ◽

Cited By ~ 20

Author(s):

Andrew Page ◽

Richard Taylor ◽

David Gunnell ◽

Greg Carter ◽

Stephen Morrell ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Young Adult ◽

Suicide Prevention ◽

Young Male ◽

Prevention Strategy ◽

Youth Suicide ◽

Annual Average ◽

Suicide Rates ◽

Male Suicide ◽

Prevention Activity ◽

Prevention Activities

BackgroundAfter an epidemic rise in Australian young male suicide rates over the 1970s to 1990s, the period following the implementation of the original National Youth Suicide Prevention Strategy (NYSPS) in 1995 saw substantial declines in suicide in young men.AimsTo investigate whether areas with locally targeted suicide prevention activity implemented after 1995 experienced lower rates of young adult suicide, compared with areas without such activity.MethodLocalities with or without identified suicide prevention activity were compared during the period of the NYSPS implementation (1995–1998) and a period subsequent to implementation (1999–2002) to establish whether annual average suicide rates were lower and declined more quickly in areas with suicide prevention activity over the period 1995–2002.ResultsMale suicide rates were lower in areas with targeted suicide prevention activity (and higher levels of funding) compared with areas receiving no activity both during (RR = 0.89, 95% CI 0.80–0.99,P= 0.030) and after (RR = 0.86, 95% CI 0.77–0.96,P= 0.009) implementation, with rates declining faster in areas with targeted activity than in those without (13%v.10% decline). However, these differences were reduced and were no longer statistically significant following adjustment for sociodemographic variables. There was no difference in female suicide rates between areas with or without targeted suicide prevention activity.ConclusionsThere was little discernible impact on suicide rates in areas receiving locally targeted suicide prevention activities in the period following the NYSPS.

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Classical Myth and Margaret Mahy's Young Adult Fiction

10.26686/wgtn.16970257.v1 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

◽

Michael Pohl

Keyword(s):

Young Adult ◽

Young Adult Fiction ◽

Classical Myth ◽

Critical Engagement ◽

Critical Attention ◽

Classical Myths ◽

The Dead ◽

Margaret Mahy ◽

Selection Of ◽

Classical Background

<p>This thesis investigates the importance of classical myth in the young adult fiction of Margaret Mahy. Mahy's novels are full of references to classical myths, both direct and indirect, in names of characters like Dido, Ovid, Ariadne or Hero; in storylines such as Flora's journey to the Underworld-like Viridian to rescue her cousin Anthea, strongly reminiscent of Demeter's rescue of Persephone from Hades, which take their inspiration from classical myth; in seemingly incidental references like the persistent comparisons of Sorry to Charon, the classical ferryman of the dead, in The Changeover. These references point to a deep engagement with the heritage of classical myth. It is an engagement that has not gone unnoticed by scholars of Mahy's work, but it is one that has not enjoyed the dedicated critical attention it deserves. This thesis explores the full importance of classical myth to Mahy's young adult fiction, and shows how an understanding of the classical background of a large selection of Mahy's major novels can both enhance our appreciation of what is already there, as well as open up new avenues for critical engagement with her work.</p>

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