Where to from Here?: Emerging Conversations on Girls' Literature and Girlhood. Issue 1 (1st March 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Sardella-Ayres, Dawn; Reese, Ashley N.
• Is Part Of: Girlhood studies. Volume 13:Issue 1(2020)
• Page Start: 33
• Page End: 49
• Publication Date: 2020-03-01
• Subjects: bildungsroman -- domestic realism -- gender performativity -- genre theory -- North America -- social action; Girls -- Periodicals; Girls -- Social aspects -- Periodicals; Girls -- Social conditions -- Periodicals; Girls -- Education -- Periodicals; Girls -- Sexual behavior -- Periodicals; Girls -- Health and hygiene -- Periodicals; Women's studies -- Periodicals; 305.23082
• DOI: 10.3167/ghs.2020.130104
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1938-8209

Abstract

Abstract: In this article, we seek to articulate a genre theory-centered definition of girls' literature, and interrogate its subgenre, the girl's bildungsroman, as contextual, cultural sites of rhetoric regarding girls and girlhood. By exploring English-language North American girls' literature, we identify it within a framework of genre as social action, tracing the protagonists' maturation into the socially determined roles of wife and mother. We explore the ways in which the girl's bildungsroman follows a home-away-home model, but with the end result of socially acceptable community integration, rather than the boy's bildungsroman' s culmination in heroic independent identity via quests and adventures.