American Girl Research Articles

Deconstructing Desire: Criticism of Western Romantic Narratives in Mitski's "Your Best American Girl" Music Video

Mitski Miyawaki, a Japanese American indie-rock artist professionally known as Mitski, wrote her 2016 song, “Your Best American Girl,” from the perspective of a woman who is unable to have a relationship with her love interest due to their different racial and cultural backgrounds. The accompanying music video engages with the song’s social message while adding nuance and complexity to it. Many of the lyrics portray Mitski’s feelings of isolation as an Asian American woman, especially through their employment of Japanese cultural symbols, while the music video uses parody, camera angles, and Americana iconography to further illustrate Mitski’s experiences of isolation. This essay analyzes the subtle ways in which “Your Best American Girl” subverts Asian stereotypes and destabilizes white patriarchal structures that are perpetrated by popular media, particularly through white centrality in the indie-rock genre. Comparison of “Your Best American Girl” to Lana Del Rey’s “Born to Die” music video reveals how “Your Best American Girl” uses parody techniques to criticize this white centrality. Further, its references to PJ Harvey allows Mitski to occupy a similar position of musical authenticity and command respect. Through lyrical, musical, and visual storytelling, “Your Best American Girl” chronicles Mitski’s journey towards self-acceptance, while critiquing the pervasive whiteness in romantic narratives.

Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye : A Critical Analysis

Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye : A Critical Analysis

Cultural Hegemony of English Toward Americans as Seen in Wild Child Film by Nick Moore

The present study aims to depict the hegemony and the way cultural hegemony influences cultural issues in Wild Child film. Therefore, the main data sources were the script of The Wild Child by Nick Moore and the book which tells the contents of the film. To collect the data, the researcher used library research. The qualitative descriptive was used to explore the issues found in this study. Based on the study, it was found that there are some norms found in which the English hegemonies to the American girl of the main character in this film. Those are norms, language, and values. The study also showed that the behavior of the main character “Poppy” was influenced by the Americans. Based on the data result there are two (character, and attitudes) influenced of cultural Hegemony among the Americans and English in this film.

First in My Family: A Native American Girl's Continuing Journey to Becoming a Physician

First in My Family: A Native American Girl's Continuing Journey to Becoming a Physician

Imaginations and Imaginary Glass: Building an American Girl Doll Collection for Everyone

Imaginations and Imaginary Glass: Building an American Girl Doll Collection for Everyone

The Issue of Racial Microagression in Indian-American Children’s Novel: American as Paneer Pie by Supriya Kelkar

This research attempts to highlight the issue of microaggressions that occurs in American ethnic minority groups, particularly among Indian-American children featured in the children's novel <em>American as Paneer Pie</em>. Published in 2020, this novel is written by an Indian-American writer named Supriya Kelkar. <em>American as Paneer Pie</em> tells about the story of Lekha, an Indian-American girl who faces racial microaggressions at school. This research identifies the acts of racial microaggressions that occur to the character Lekha in the novel American as Paneer Pie. As a literary analysis, this research uses intrinsic approaches by Pickering and Hoeper as the intrinsic analysis and the theory of microaggressions by DeraldWing Sue as the extrinsic analysis to reveal the problems. The research findings indicate that there are found some acts of racial microaggressions faced by Lekha as an Indian American girl such as mispronouncing her Indian name, stereotyping her Indian physical appearance and lifestyle, and marginalizing her as the minority in the class. These racial microaggressions finally influence her life to change herself to voice her right as the American.

‘Thy Servant Forever’

Abstract This article expands scholarly definitions of female religious authority—conversations that typically focus on women—by situating girlhood as an equally important site of receiving, developing, and performing religious agency. Using a biographical case study approach, the article examines the life of Mary Chrystie, a deeply pious American girl who lived from 1825–1841 in the mid-Atlantic region and left one of the most substantial extant primary source collections produced by a child from this period. Her life represents the religious potency of girlhood’s “in-between status” to building female-centric sacred repositories. To demonstrate this dynamic, the article analyzes Mary’s stewardship over her spiritual interiority, participation in religious communities, and her engagement with voluntarism. Ultimately, this article demonstrates the necessity of incorporating age as a category of analysis into gendered reformulations of religious authority, allowing girls to be integrated into scholarly narratives of women’s religious history as actors in their own right.

Pragmatic Study of Bullying in “An American Girl: Chrissa Stands Strong” Movie

This study explores the phenomenon of bullying as a prominent sociocultural element within the American film "An American Girl: Chrissa Stands Strong" serve the dual purpose of providing amusement to audiences while also conveying messages of communication, morality, culture, society, and education. In addition to that, bullying remains a widespread problem within the educational institutions. Students, especially those with special cases are constant victims of bullying. The data will be subjected to analysis based on pragmatic theories, such as speech acts and strategies of impoliteness. The questions that the paper tries to answer are: what are the types of verbal bullying and its directness, what are the types of speech acts, what are the illocutionary acts and the directness of speech acts, and what are the impoliteness strategies? This study aims to identify the types and directness of verbal bullying, investigate the types of speech acts in the selected data whether it is used directly or indirectly, identifying the illocutionary acts, and investigating the impoliteness strategies and it is sub-types in "An American Girl: Chrissa Stands Strong" movie. Working on these aims, it is hypothesized that direct verbal bullying of verbal abuse is the predominant type, all the types of speech acts are employed by bullies, the impoliteness strategies are used equally. The study's findings indicate that the predominant kind of bullying observed is direct verbal bullying, characterized by instances of verbal abuse and name-calling. The direct expressive speech acts of mocking/taunting are widely used by girls in "An American Girl: Chrissa Stands Strong" movie. Positive impoliteness strategy is the most frequent strategy.

Multilingual and Multicultural Childhood: Robin Ha’s Almost American Girl

Abstract Robin Ha’s Almost American Girl (2020) visualizes the narrator’s childhood in South Korea and the United States through a multilingual and multimodal lens. Taking advantage of comics’ unique formal properties, Ha’s work situates the narrator’s memories and experiences as a teen immigrant at the nexus of Korean, English, and visual languages. This article examines how Ha’s book addresses social discrimination, linguistic hybridization, and intertextual cross-cultural encounters, while telling a coming-of-age story. It discusses how Ha utilizes colors and symbols to map the young narrator’s struggles with language barriers; how her book dismantles linguistic walls and highlights the fluidity between languages and cultures; and how it blurs the boundaries among lived experiences, memories, and the fantasy world of comics. Overall, Ha’s “expansive visual vernacular” (Miller “Innovative Autobiography,” 6) helps the narrator navigate challenges as she learns English and guides the reader through a multilingual and multicultural landscape.

Research: Solidarity-as-Project: Charting Democratic Co-inquiries in an Asian American Girl and Woman–Centric English Education Community

Informed by AsianCrit, sociocultural literacy studies, and solidarity scholarship, this article examines how an Indian American woman scholar-practitioner and eight Indonesian American girls collectively engaged with civic learning in an out-of-school critical English education space. The researcher offers the construct of solidarity-as-project by tracing examples of how the facilitator and participants crossed boundaries of identity and experience to interdependently learn about and centralize Asian American civic legacies. The researcher also considers the complications of power and diversity in those co-learning processes. The article concludes with recommendations for how English teacher education can orient teacher candidates toward enacting solidarity-as-project alongside Asian American girls and young women.

Celebrate with me: a black adolescent girl’s speculative multimodal design of intersectional college and career futures

PurposeThis paper aims to demonstrate how Alayah, a 16-year-old African American girl, leverages multiple expressive modes for intersectional self-representation as speculative design. Here, speculative design refers to a multimodal composition (i.e. digital collage) which leverages multiple expressive modes for intersectional self-celebration in possible futures.Design/methodology/approachInformed by intersectional multimodal literacy frameworks and analyses, this paper addresses the question, “How does Alayah represent her college and career futures in her speculative multimodal design? To address this question, the author analyzed Alayah's digital collage using an intersectional multimodal analysis template complemented by a thematic analysis of her interview data and the narrated explanation of her collage.FindingsIn a speculative design composed of 15 images and words, Alayah agentively determined and critically celebrated her intersectional college and career futures through four interrelated themes: Black girl affirmation; Collegiate success; “Sweet” work; and Black livingness.Originality/valueBy centering Black girls’ speculative multimodal designs in college and career curricula, ELA educators (re)imagine college and career pedagogies to critically celebrate Black adolescent girls as intelligent, empowered and literate young women worthy of the futures that they desire.

Revisiting Tocqueville’s American Woman

This paper revisits Tocqueville’s famous portrait of the American female, which begins with assertions of her equality to males but ends with her self-cloistering in the domestic sphere. Taking a cue from Tocqueville’s extended sketch of the “faded” pioneer wife in “A Fortnight in the Wilderness” and drawing connections to Tocqueville’s criticisms of the division of industrial labor, I argue that the American girl’s ostensibly free choice to remove herself from public life is not an act of freedom. Rather, it is a manifestation of a particular type of unfreedom that reveals underappreciated connections between the two great dangers about which Democracy in America warns: tyrannical majoritarianism and soft despotism. My argument that the girl’s choice to withdraw from public life is coerced rather than free thus highlights the nonpolitical sources of oppression that exist within democratic societies. The paper concludes by raising questions about the need for coercion within Tocquevillian democracy and the implications of this for Tocqueville’s “new” political science—indeed, for his liberalism more generally.

It’s All about the Toys!

It’s All about the Toys!

American Girl Dolls as Professionals

American Girl Dolls as Professionals

The Unwonted Veil: A Pediatric Case of a Dermatologic Complication Following a COVID-19 Infection

One week after contracting COVID-19, an 8-year-old African American girl developed a rash covering her face and parts of her arm. This rash resolved after four weeks after treatment with Pimecrolimus cream and barrier repair cream. While no unique exanthem is associated with COVID-19, it has been linked to various cutaneous symptoms. As a result, healthcare providers must be aware of this potential link while examining their patients and be prepared to give counseling to help patients cope with any psychological stress connected with these symptoms.

DECODING INTERDISCURSIVITY AS AN EFFECTIVE MECHANISM FOR RECREATING HISTORY IN SHASHI THAROOR'S RIOT

Shashi Tharoor, a renowned Indian English writer, is often highlighted for his exceptional language skills and writing style. Among his three novels, Riot has been largely devoted to visualize the effects of postcolonialism in India and to record the historically signicant moments after western colonization. The story has been setup on the backdrop of communal riot in the ctional village, Zalilgarh. The communal riot for years has been regarded as a prominent issue in the post-colonial India. Though, Tharoor's major focus is on the description of India, the story revolves around the death of an American girl, Priscilla Hart. The entire novel talks about the mysterious death of Priscilla Hart during the riot. The paper focuses on Tharoor's unique narrative technique of blending various literary genres in his historical ction to recapture the moments in Indian history

Methodical control of the difficult pediatric airway: two case reports

BackgroundManagement of children who present with a history of impossible mask ventilation or difficult tracheal intubation is fraught with challenges. Despite this, the “airway stress test” of an inhalational induction is frequently employed risking airway obstruction, breath holding, apnea, and laryngospasm.Case presentationsWe present two cases of children with anticipated difficult airway management. The first child (14-year-old African American boy) had severe mucopolysaccharidosis with a history of failed anesthetic induction and failed airway management. The second child (3-year-old African American girl) had progressive lymphatic infiltration of the tongue, resulting in severe macroglossia. We describe a technique that forgoes inhalational induction, incorporates recent pediatric airway guidelines, and provides a greater margin of safety. The technique encompasses the use of drugs that facilitate sedation for intravenous access, without respiratory depression or airway obstruction, titrated use of medications to achieve anesthetic depth while preserving ventilatory drive and airway tone, and the continuous provision of directed oxygen flow during airway manipulation. Propofol and volatile gases were avoided to preserve airway tone and respiratory drive.ConclusionsWe emphasize that an intravenous induction technique utilizing medications that preserve airway tone and ventilatory drive, and the use of continuous oxygen flow throughout airway manipulation, allows for successful management of children with a difficult airway. The common practice of volatile inhalational induction should be avoided in anticipated difficult pediatric airways.

Things We Lost to the Water. By Eric Nguyen

History is cyclic. And so is the theme of Eric Nguyen’s debut novel that begins and ends with a Vietnamese refugee woman bearing a storm in America. A beautiful, intimate tale of overlapping histories, Things We Lost to the Water mediates on the theme of water to link the disparate colonial histories of place and persons. The story begins with a family of Vietnamese refugees finding their way in the American city of New Orleans in the late 20th century. Hương, the matriarch and protagonist, lost her husband as they were fleeing Vietnam post-Vietnam/American War. She raises two sons in America as a single mother. The main question of this novel is what happened to Hương’s husband, Công, who was left behind in Vietnam during their escape. While trying to make sense of resettlement and figuring out the whereabouts of their father, life goes on for Tuấn and Bình (Ben), sons of Hương. Tuấn finds community in the Southern Boyz, a Vietnamese street gang in New Orleans comprised of teenagers that formed to protect the Vietnamese community from racism and harassment in America. Tuấn is dating Thảo, the unspoken matriarch of the Southern Boyz. She is a Vietnamese American girl that embraces and is prideful in her Vietnamese heritage. Whereas his brother veered towards a life on the streets, Ben found solace in his studies. Ben is a young queer Vietnamese American boy who is finding himself in New Orleans as he looks for his father around the world. His childhood best friend, Adelaide (Addy) Toussaint, is a witty young Haitian immigrant girl from a single-father household.

All in a Day’s Play: How a Child Resists Linguistic Racism and Constructs Her Identity

Set in one of the least privileged neighborhoods of the US Southeast, this research project took a discourse analysis approach to construct a day-in-the-life case study. It illustrates how, during an after school storybook cooking class, a 7-year-old, multilingual, Mexican American girl navigated local linguistic microaggressions and extended microaffirmations to her peers. At the same time, she contested and critiqued societal power imbalances associated with whiteness. This study widens the corpus of scholarship that has primarily examined children’s sociodramatic play and literacy development in preschool settings. It also broadens the body of research that has predominantly focused on students’ linguistic dexterity and metalinguistic awareness in middle and high school contexts.

An American Girl at Napoleon's Tomb

An American Girl at Napoleon's Tomb