Category Archives: Thinking Through Childhood

“After Developmentalism: Toward a Theory of the Human”

Gabrielle Owen
This form of exploitation, the use of the child to meet adult needs, is built into the social conception of what a child is in the first place. If such a relation appears “natural” according to the definitional bounds of what a child is, then we must reckon with the degree to which exploitation is foundational to the Western idea of childhood itself. Read More



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“Sentimental Origins: Queer Friendship and the Bildungsroman”

Kristen Proehl
Queer friendships challenge the devaluation of platonic relationships in contrast to romantic, familial, and/or biological relationships. Queer friendships, I argue, are a pervasive convention of YA literature and play a crucial role in many adolescent protagonists’ understanding of their identities and relation to the world. Read More


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