{"product_id":"transforming-girls-the-work-of-nineteenth-century-adolescence-paperback-softback-9781496836274","title":"Transforming Girls; The Work of Nineteenth-Century Adolescence (Paperback \/ softback) 9781496836274","description":"\u003cfont face=\"Georgia\"\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"6\"\u003eTransforming Girls\u003c\/font\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\r\n\u003cfont size=\"5\"\u003eThe Work of Nineteenth-Century Adolescence\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"4\"\u003eJulie Pfeiffer (Author)\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e9781496836274\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003ePaperback \/ softback, published 30 October 2021\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e210 pages, 23 b\u0026amp;w illustrations\u003cbr\u003e21.5 x 13.9 x 1.2 cm, 0.333 kg\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003cp align=\"justify\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e\u003ci\u003eTransforming Girls: The Work of Nineteenth-Century Adolescence\u003c\/i\u003e explores the paradox of the nineteenth-century girls’ book. On the one hand, early novels for adolescent girls rely on gender binaries and suggest that girls must accommodate and support a patriarchal framework to be happy. On the other, they provide access to imagined worlds in which teens are at the center. The early girls’ book frames female adolescence as an opportunity for productive investment in the self. This is a space where mentors who trust themselves, the education they provide, and the girl’s essentially good nature neutralize the girl’s own anxieties about maturity. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThese mid-nineteenth-century novels focus on female adolescence as a social category in unexpected ways. They draw not on a twentieth-century model of the alienated adolescent, but on a model of collaborative growth. The purpose of these novels is to approach adolescence—a category that continues to engage and perplex us—from another perspective, one in which fluid identity and the deliberate construction of a self are celebrated. They provide alternatives to cultural beliefs about what it was like to be a white, middle-class girl in the nineteenth century and challenge the assumption that the evolution of the girls’ book is always a movement towards less sexist, less restrictive images of girls. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDrawing on best-selling novels in the United States and Germany (where this genre is referred to as \u003ci\u003eBackfischliteratur\u003c\/i\u003e), \u003ci\u003eTransforming Girls\u003c\/i\u003e reframes our understanding of the history of the girls’ book and provides insightful readings of forgotten bestsellers. It also outlines an alternate model for imagining adolescence and supporting adolescent girls. The awkward adolescent girl—so popular in mid-nineteenth-century fiction for girls—remains a valuable resource for understanding contemporary girls and stories about them.\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003c\/font\u003e","brand":"University Press of Mississippi","offers":[{"title":"Brand New","offer_id":52739553132824,"sku":"9781496836274","price":25.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"url":"https:\/\/freshlyprintedbooks.co.uk\/products\/transforming-girls-the-work-of-nineteenth-century-adolescence-paperback-softback-9781496836274","provider":"Freshly Printed Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}