Evaluating J.D. Salinger’s Female Characters Through Beauvoir's French Feminist Theory

J.D. Salinger’s books have brought new and experimental ideas to post-World War II America; for example, the introduction of the adolescent perspective in The Catcher in the Rye. This innovation resulted in a majority of the critical analysis conducted to be based on the adolescent perspective. However, since this criticism is primarily focused on the main character, Holden Caulfield’s, perspective, analysis of Salinger’s female characters’ perspective has been discounted in the academic world. The lack of female perspective recognized in Salinger’s novels makes it difficult for female readers to identify with his characters. This study aims to bring forth Salinger’s most prominent female characters fromThe Catcher in the Rye and Franny and Zooey and evaluate their alignment with Simone De Beauvoir’s French feminist theory. The French feminist theory focuses on how women are taught that they are the “other” sex in comparison with men from a young age, and what situations a woman must be in to transcend subordination. The researcher designed a rubric including the primary ideas of Beauvoir’s French feminist theory as described in the second volume of her book The Second Sex and tested the ideas’ alignment with selected characters. All of the characters chosen aligned with ideas of the theory to some extent, which shows that many of Salinger’s most prominent female characters occupy subordinate positions in comparison to their male counterpart. This research can serve as a basis for how Salinger’s female characters can continue to be studied in the future.

ADHD in Adolescents: Commentary on the Special Issue of Ripple Effects in Self-Perceptions and Social Relationships

Adolescence is a developmental period that affords both risk as well as enormous opportunity. Ripple effects can extend far and wide and speak to the nuance and complexity in understanding and treating ADHD during the adolescent period. The studies in this special issue provide novel and important insights into the lives of adolescents with ADHD, and they collectively point to important areas for both research and clinical attention. Further, each of the studies underscore the importance of soliciting the perspective of adolescents with ADHD. In this commentary, I consider the value of self-report when working with adolescents with ADHD, the possibility of a self-perception bias in youth with ADHD, challenges in assessing social functioning in adolescence, and implications for school-based assessments and interventions. For treatment specifically, I raise the possibility of a modular intervention approach for adolescents with ADHD and shared decision making that solicits and incorporates the adolescent perspective. The voices of adolescents with ADHD may be crucial for understanding how to lower risk, promote resilience, reduce stigma, and improve our assessments and interventions.

Mother-Adolescent Emotion Dynamics during Conflicts: Associations with Perspective Taking

Parent-adolescent emotion dynamics are central to psychosocial adjustment during this developmental period. Perspective taking—the ability to take another’s point of view into consideration—develops significantly during adolescence and is important for successful interpersonal functioning in contexts such as conflicts between family members. We used grid-sequence analysis (Brinberg et al., 2017) to examine inter-dyad differences in mother-adolescent emotion dynamics during a conflict discussion, and whether inter-dyad differences were associated with maternal and adolescent perspective taking. Mothers and their typically-developing adolescents (N = 49, Mage = 14.84 years) were video-recorded during a 10-minute conflict discussion. We identified patterns of multi-step chains of expressed emotions that unfolded during the conflict and how interdyad differences in those patterns were associated with maternal and adolescent perspective taking. Dyads differed with respect to whether they showed turn-taking in validation and interest behaviors, or whether they showed patterns of reciprocated negative affect. Higher adolescent but not maternal perspective taking was associated with dyadic turn-taking of validation and interest. Maternal and adolescent perspective taking were not associated with the pattern of reciprocated negative affect. Taken together, results highlight the importance of examining the complex process of emotion dynamics in parent-adolescent interactions.

COLLOQUAIL, SLANG AND TRANSFORMATIONAL LANGUAGE: COMPERATIVE STUDY

This research is aimed to find a comparison of how each language (colloquail, slang, transformational) are formed, in what context is used, and what is the perspective of the use of these three languages. This research is descriptive qualitative research. At the stage of providing data, researchers use Simak and Cakap technique. In the process of data analysis, the researchers use the method of padan and agih method. The agih method is used to look at the slang language constructs in each period while the method of padan is used to describe the adolescent Perspective in the use of colloquail, slang and transformational language from time to time. The result of the research shows that the way how the three non standard language is different from each other. Colloquail language are formed by changing “a” to “e” in final syllable, Deletion of First Syllable, New word formation, Additional Syllable “nge”, Change “a” to “e” in final syllable and add “an”, and Additional particle “deh”, “aja”, “kok”, “ama”. Slang language are formed by Initial Each Word Collection, Word letter choosen, Deletion of initial letter and syllable, Change of “s’ to “c”, Change of “k” to “q”, Change of “au” to “w”, Change of “u” to “oe”, Adoption of basic words, English language abbreviation, English-Indonesia Abreviation, Citation and new word construction.Transformational language are formed by Ga, Gi, Gu, Ge, Go formula after single vowel sound syllable, Ga/G, Gi, Gu, Ge, Go formula before dipthong sound syllable, Ga, Gi, Gu, Ge, Go formula before last consonant sound, and Ga, Gi, Gu, Ge, Go formula for cluster consonant. The colloquial language usage context is more influenced by the habitual aspects heard by speakers in their environment such as at home, in markets, playgrounds, and certain other events. Slang languages, its use is influenced by the juvenile community environment where users only on the uses level 12 to 19 years. Transformational language was influenced by the desire to hide speech to people who were not from their groups like parents and strangers.