Overview

Identity, Criticality, and Advocacy in Young Adult Literature explores teaching strategies for incorporating young adult literature (YAL) as a tool for developing identity, criticality, and advocacy both inside and outside English language arts (ELA) classrooms. Censors are stripping young people of the power to read and learn about the world in ways relevant to them. To combat this, we share how teachers engage adolescents with young adult literature and address issues of identity, criticality, and advocacy. With teaching ideas and contributions from top scholars in young adult literature, each chapter of this book provides before-, during-, and after-reading strategies to teach in middle and secondary classrooms with specific young adult novels. The chapters focus on topics such as race and identity, technology and artificial intelligence, environmental and ecological issues, LGBTQIA+ history, mental health literacy, and more. This is an essential resource for preservice teachers in teaching methods, young adult literature, reading and writing, and social justice education courses and is relevant to all teachers of middle and high school students.

Full Product Details

Author:   Steffany Comfort Maher ,  Alice Hays
Publisher:   Taylor & Francis Ltd
Imprint:   Routledge
ISBN:  

9781041124740

ISBN 10:   1041124740
Pages:   240
Publication Date:   10 March 2026
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Forthcoming
Availability:   Not yet available  
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Table of Contents

Section 1: Identity 1. Issues of Identity in YA Science Fiction Depicting Artificial Intelligence and Cybernetics 2. Analyzing Community Cultural Wealth in With the Fire on High to Foster Asset-based Perspectives 3. Examining Young Adult Literature through a Rogerian Perspective: Self-Actualization in I am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter 4. Huda F Are You: Playing with Language in YA Literature to Explore Multiple Identities 5. Using Charlie Jane Anders’s Victories Greater than Death to Explore the Possibilities of Imagined Worlds and Transgender Narratives in the High School ELA Classroom 6. Examining Intersectional Identities: Using Fantasy Novels to Understand Multifaceted Identities Section 2: Criticality 7. What Do Students Deserve in Secondary ELA Classrooms? Promoting Criticality with We Deserve Monuments 8. Analyzing Starr’s Identity in The Hate U Give using Critical Race Feminism 9. Environmental Criticality in Darcie Little Badger’s A Snake Falls to Earth 10. Teaching Criticality with The Last Cuentista 11. Burning a House in the Sky: Narrative Writing & Grief-Responsive Pedagogy 12. Down Came the Rain: A Critical Examination of the Intersectionality of Ecological Disaster 13. The Self/ves as Locations of Resistance in La Borinqueña Section 3: Advocacy 14. How to Become the Sun – Walking with Ger Duany: Advocacy In and Out of the Classroom 15. Voices in Print, Power in Action: Young Adult Literature as an Invitation to Adolescent Activism and Agency 16. Fostering Mental Health Literacy through Curriculum and Classroom Conversation on Ab(solutely) Normal 17. Teaching LGBTQIA+ History Through Young Adult Literature: Vehicles for Student Understanding, Empathy, and Advocacy 18. Advocating for Consent: Exploring Sexual Assault in Young Adult Literature 19. From the Book to the Board of Education: Lessons on Criticality, Collectivity and Class Struggle from Shadowshaper and the Earthseed series Section 4: Conclusion 20. Protecting the Freedom to Read: Nurturing and Sustaining Advocacy in Teachers, Students and Communities

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Author Information

Steffany Comfort Maher is an associate professor of English education and director of the IUS Writing Project at Indiana University Southeast. Her research interests include critical inquiry approaches to teaching literature, critical methods of teaching young adult literature, and critical youth studies. Prior to earning her doctorate, Dr. Maher taught middle and high school English and social studies for 12 years in Michigan. Alice Hays is an associate professor and chair of the Teacher Education Department at California State University, Bakersfield. During her Ph.D. work, Dr. Hays taught English composition at the college level. Prior to that, Dr. Hays taught high school English for 19 years in Arizona.

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