Sections offered SPRING 2019:
#9526 |
GARETH EVANS |
MW 4:00pm-5:15pm |
HU 108 |
#10738 |
GARETH EVANS |
MW 2:30pm-3:45pm |
HU 108 |
CLASS NOTES: IUB GenEd A&H credit; COLL (CASE) A&H Breadth of Inquiry credit
Young Adult Fiction (YAF) is all the rage these days. While roughly 3,000 Young Adult titles were published in 1997, 10,276 were published in 2012. What’s more, YAF is being bought and read by adults as well as young adults. The term YAF, however, was not invented until the 1960s. That does not mean there was no fiction written for young adults before the 1960s, but it does mean it took the book trade a long time to recognize that young people, teenagers, made up a specific market at which fiction might be aimed. In Young Adult Fiction, we will read books that have either been aimed at young adults from the 1840s until the present, or are currently taught to young adults in the United Kingdom. We will begin with Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women. While Alcott’s novel was clearly aimed at young women, Horatio Alger’s Ragged Dick seem equally clearly aimed at young men. When we read Alcott and Alger we will be concerned, in part, with the extent to which gender expectations have changed between the mid 19th-century and the present. We will next read two novels—Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, and Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go—15 and 16 year olds were or are supposed to read for school in the United Kingdom between the 1970s and the present. We will end the class with three recent examples of YAF: American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang, The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, and Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J.K. Rowling. Questions we consider will include the following: What do books written, and sometimes taught, in different periods tell us about what authors and publishers expect teenagers to be capable of reading and enjoying? To what extent do expectations about teenagers and adults change between the 1840s and the present? To what extent do expectations about teenagers and adults change between the 1970s and the present? What, if anything, are readers supposed to learn from reading Young Adult Fiction? Is the increasing popularity and changing nature of Young Adult Fiction positive or is it alarming?
Reading:
- Louisa May Alcott, Little Women.
- Horatio Alger, Ragged Dick.
- Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice.
- Kazuo Ishiguro, Never Let Me Go.
- Suzanne Collins, The Hunger Games.
- Gene Luen Yang, American Born Chinese.
- J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone.
Writing Requirements:
Either three 6 to 8 page essays, or one 6 to 8 page essay and one research essay of 12-15 pages. Seven blog posts, and participation in a group that teaches one of the sessions on either The Hunger Games or Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. Essays count for 65% of final grade, blog posts count for 25% of final grade, and group teaching counts for 15% of final grade.