Young Adult Literature and Adolescent Identity Across Cultures and Classrooms

Taking a critical, research-oriented perspective, this exploration of the theoretical, empirical, and pedagogical connections between the reading and teaching of young adult literature and adolescent identity development centers around three key questions:
Who are the teens reading young adult literature?
Why should teachers teach young adult literature?
Why are teens reading young adult literature?
All chapters work simultaneously on two levels: each provides both a critical resource about contemporary young adult literature that could be used in YA literature classes or workshops and specific practical suggestions about what texts to use and how to teach them effectively in middle and high school classes.
Theorizing, problematizing, and reflecting in new ways on the teaching and reading of young adult literature in middle and secondary school classrooms, this valuable resource for teachers and teacher educators will help them to develop classrooms where students use literature as a means of making sense of themselves, each other, and the world around them.

Janet Alsup is Associate Professor of English Education at Purdue University with a joint appointment in the College of Liberal Arts and the College of Education.

1 Introduction: Identification, Actualization, or Education: Why Teach YA?, Janet Alsup Part I: Who are the Teens Reading YA? 2 African American Young Adult Literature and Black Adolescent Identity: Developing a Sense of Self and Society Through Narrative, Joy Dangora 3 Depictions of Chinese Americans in Young Adult Literature: American Born Chinese and Beyond, Nai- Hua Kuo 4 Composing Themselves: The Discursive (De) Construction of Queer Identity in 6 Young Adult Novels, James R. Gilligan 5 Teaching Through the Conflict: Examining the Value of Culturally Authentic Arabic Young Adult Literature, Nisreen Anati 6 Culture and Language: The Two Tongues of Mexican-American Young Adult Literature, William J. Broz and René Saldaña Jr. Part II: Why Should Teachers Teach YA? 7 Developing the Moral Identity Through Young Adult Fantasy Literature, Aliel Cunningham 8 Beyond the Comics Page: Pedagogical Opportunities and Challenges in Teaching Graphic Novels, Lisa Schade Eckert 9 Pedagogues and Demigods: Captivity, Pedagogy, and Young Adult Literature in an Age of Diminished Expectations, Jeff Spanke 10 Perspective Giving and Taking in the Secondary English Class: Considering the Case of Erin Gruwell, Jeanne Smith Muzzillo Part III: Why Are Teens Reading YA? 11 The Appeal of Young Adult Literature in Late Adolescence: College Freshmen Read, Gail Zdilla 12 Female Reader Reading YA: Understanding Norman Holland's Identity Themes Thirty Years Later, Janet Alsup