Abstract
This article argues that emotions are utilized for norm breaking, identity formation, and socialization in S.E. Hinton’s YA novel The Outsiders (1967). Drawing on the history of emotions studies, it investigates how emotional expressions are utilized to negotiate and contest given emotional norms on the one hand, and Young Adult literary conventions on the other. The point of departure is intersectional and focuses on the relationship between emotion, power, and socialization. In particular, the article considers how intersections of age, gender, and class relate to depictions of feeling and establishing of new emotional norms. The article shows that the feelings that the main character Pony expresses are part of a reiterative process of negotiation of power; they work as instruments for changing emotional norms connected to his age, class, and gender.
Highlights
Hinton’s pioneering YA novel, The Outsiders (1967), emotions are utilized for norm breaking, identity formation, and socialization
Her research interests include YA, picture books, emotion history, intersectionality studies, space and place, and urbanity. She is a member of the editorial board of Nordic Journal of ChildLit Aesthetics and the guest editor of the latest volume of Swedish Barnboken: Journal of Children’s Literature Research
During the postwar era a youth culture spread around the Western world, as a growing number of young people were questioning the dominant values of society
Summary
The theoretical and methodological framework of this article is constituted from research on the history of emotion and, to some extent, affect theory. Young Adults (Bullen et al, 2018) – demonstrate a great variety of ways to work with emotion and juvenile fiction in terms of norms, identity, and power, amongst other perspectives. The responsibility of children for their own feelings and personal self-development increased during the twentieth century These processes are neither linear nor homogeneous; countertendencies and conflicts can be found across time The term explains how individuals can express and perform emotions differently in different contexts, being part of several communities with varying emotional norms and preferences It is especially important in dealing with YA literature, which is in itself situated at the intersection between different age-related communities. The analysis will examine utterances and descriptions of physical, as well as mental emotional expressions
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