This study explored the nature and performance of masculinity as portrayed in three popular young adult novels: two novels featuring male protagonists and one featuring a female protagonist. Drawing on emerging theory and scholarship, researchers view masculinity, like femininity, as a gendered performance, socially scripted but amenable to…

This article offers teachers a critical framework for use and adaptation in organizing class discussions focused on notions of freedom in young adult literature. The authors open by discussing the notion of freedom, including concepts related to negative and positive freedom and to arguments advocating critical discussion of common assumptions…

Explores preservice elementary teachers' literature-circle discussion of a multicultural young-adult novel with a focus on two research questions: how preservice teachers discuss a multicultural young-adult novel, and what are the views and theories that informed their understanding of literature response discussion. Participants in the discussion…

Notes that adolescent readers view characters in young adult novels as living and wrestling with real problems close to their own life experiences as teens. Reviews recent studies related to teaching literature and adolescent identity construction. Offers a framework teachers can use to initiate discussions based on critical literacy in their own…

Explored Banks' stages of ethnic identity development as a framework for discussing young adult, multiethnic literature in graduate level literature circles. Interviews, field notes, videotapes, journals, and ethnic identity protocols indicated that using the typology stimulated quality discussions, and students reflected on their own ethnic…

Explores the reader response patterns and intergenerational dialogue produced by five high school/university student pairs reading and reacting to a young adult multicultural novel, Gary Soto's "Buried Onions." Concludes that participants offered multiple perspectives, maintained mutual respect for each other's interpretations, and revealed the…

Examines the young adult novel "California Blue" and provides related learning activities designed to foster critical thinking skills in high school students. The novel is set in the Northern California logging country where environmental concerns pit a teenager against his family and community. Addresses issues of citizenship education.…

This study explored 22 ninth-grade English students' reading engagement and interpretation of a young adult multicultural novel dealing with biethnic identity development. The descriptive multicase study charted students' literary engagement in an urban technology magnet school and a rural Hawaii high school. The research question was: What are…