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YOUNG ADULT LITERATURE:

Creating Empathy and Understanding Through Reading

Getty Images, 2020

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RESEARCH QUESTION

How can young adult literature be used by teens, young adults, and adults in general as a resource for understanding the world at large?

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GOALS

Research possible impact of Young Adult literature

Apply literary theories to text to facilitate discussion

Place literature and current events in discussion

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DOES YA LITERATURE HAVE AN IMPACT?

55% of YA Literature is being actively purchased by people ages 14 – 44.

28% of this market is made up of people ages 30 – 44.

78% of purchases by ages 30 – 44 are purely for enjoyment.

-- ”Understanding the Children’s Book Consumer in the Digital Age”, Bowker Market Research, 2012.

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LOUISE ROSENBLATT– READER RESPONSE THEORY

Reader Response theory is often described as a transactional relationship in which the reader provides “[their] culture, [their] past experiences, [their] cognitive ability” into the relationship (Rosenblatt 71).
Two different types of reading:

- Aesthetic Reading

- Efferent Reading

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WOLFGANG ISER– READER RESPONSE THEORY

“The familiar facilitates our comprehension of the unfamiliar, but the unfamiliar in turn restructures our comprehension of the familiar” (Iser 94).

Reader A Text

Meaning #1

Reader B Text

Meaning #2

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W.E.B DU BOIS – DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS

“One ever feels his twoness, -- an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled strivings; two warring ideals in one dark body, who’s dogged strength alone keeps it from being torn asunder” (xxiii).
Code-Switching is a function of Double Consciousness

Informal Sentence in Black Community	Code-Switched Sentence
Y’all be playin’.	You guys are always playing.

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METHODOLOGY

Background Research on the Novels

Aesthetic Reading of the Novels

Compile Research on Current Events

Narrate the Conversation

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THE “NEGRO PROBLEM”

The Talk
The Interaction
The Altercation

Refinery29, 2018

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DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS �AND CODE SWITCHING

“Being two different people is so exhausting. I’ve taught myself to speak with two different voices and only say certain things around certain people. I’ve mastered it” (Thomas 301).

Refinery29, 2018

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LITERATURE AND CURRENT EVENTS IN CONVERSATION

“It’s also about Oscar. �Aiyana. Trayvon. Rekia. Michael. Eric. Tamir. John. Ezell. Sandra. Freddie. Alton. Philando. �It’s even about that little boy in 1955 who nobody recognized at first – Emmett. �The messed up part? There are so many more” (Thomas 386-387).

The Week UK, 2022

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APPLICATION IN THE CLASSROOM

Before Reading

- Create guidelines for healthy discussion in the classroom

- Encourage questions, research, and discussions

- Define difficult terms

During Reading

- Utilize articles/videos for literature-to-life connections

- Implement an out-of-class assignment for further reflection

- Encourage students to look towards the author

After Reading

- Invite guest speakers with knowledge on the topic

- Watch a related movie/documentary

- Complete a reflective project

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REFERENCES

Du Bois, W. E. B. “The Study of the Negro Problems.” The Annals of the American

Academy of Political and Social Science, vol. 11, Jan. 1898, pp. 1–23. JSTOR,

www.jstor.org/stable/1009474.

Du Bois, W. E. B., and Jonathan Scott Holloway. The Souls of Black Folk. First Yale

University Press Edition 2015 ed., Yale University Press, 2015.

Davis, Judith Rae. “Reconsidering Readers: Louise Rosenblatt and Reader-Response

Pedagogy.” Research and Teaching in Developmental Education, vol. 8, no. 2,

1992, pp. 71–81. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/42802433. Accessed 30 Oct.

2020.

Iser, Wolfgang. The Act of Reading: A Theory of Aesthetic Response. Johns Hopkins

University Press, 1997.

Jerald, Aysha. “Exploring the Relationship between Dystopian Literature and the

Activism of Generation Z Young Adults.” American Journal of Undergraduate

Research, vol. 16, no. 4, 2020, pp. 81–93., doi:10.33697/ajur.2020.009.

Jones, Kimberly, and Gilly Segal. I'm Not Dying with You Tonight. Sourcebooks Fire, an Imprint of Sourcebooks, 2019.

Rosenblatt, Louise M. Literature as Exploration. Vol. 5, Modern Language Association

of America, 2005.

Rosenblatt, Louise M., et al. Writing and Reading: The Transactional Theory.

Champaign, Ill. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 1988. EBSCOhost,

search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&AuthType=sso&db=edshtl&AN=e

dshtl.MIU01.011326662&site=eds-live&scope=site.

Stone, Nic. Dear Martin. Crown Publishing Group, 2017.

Thomas, Angie. The Hate U Give. Balzer + Bray, 2018.