The Bechdel test, the author's student Marley explained, is named for the US graphic novelist and cartoonist Alison Bechdel. To pass the test, a work of fiction must contain at least one scene in which two or more women (preferably named characters) discuss something other than a male. Students who read from the canon of works regularly encounter…

Examines interview responses of Mexican eighth graders about an adolescent novel that related the adventures of a female conquistador, including: their conceptions about gender, dynamics between the reader and the text, and the expression of response. Results revealed students' anxieties about gender issues, noting that how they understood these…

Discusses how three girls take up competing social messages about gendered identity in the different kinds of texts they read. Explains that it is in the complex transactions between the reader's prior lived experiences and the language of the text where meaning is shaped. Contends that when girls are encouraged to consider the actions of female…

Activities related to women's issues are many and varied at Slippery Rock University in Pennsylvania, but it is doubtful how much of this sensitivity trickles down into actual literature courses. Efforts at moving students away from passive reading and into a more critical stance that would promote active engagement with texts must be encouraged…