Topic Proposal

By Ally Dunlap -
For my research paper, my essential research question is, "How does young adult literature impact adolescents finding their voice?"
A few focus questions will be:
1. How does socioeconomic status affect language and the way people communicate?
2. Does change in environment correlate with change in vernacular?
3. Do young adult books encourage adolescents to use their voice?
4. In what situations do adolescents code switch and why?
5. Is code switching necessary for adolescents to learn/understand?
An overview of what I know going into this paper is that adolescents are all unique in their dialect and/or vernacular. The way people in society speak and interact tend to vary in different parts of the country and in different socioeconomic statuses. I chose this topic because I think that adolescents finding their voice is an important part during adolescence. Two books I chose that relate to the topic are The Hate You Give by Angie Thomas and The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian by Sherman Alexie. I plan to research articles through the USC Upstate database that discuss different vernaculars among adolescents, and I want to also look for interviews with Angie Thomas that mention her use of AAE in her novel and how important this aspect of the novel is for adolescents. An argument related to this topic is that it is important that adolescents have their own voice through their own dialect and/or vernacular while also code switching when necessary. A challenge or obstacle I may have with my research is finding scholarly articles with adolescents discussing their experiences with their own language and what their voice means to them.

Comments

  1. Griffin ThomasNovember 12, 2019 at 1:18 PM

    Hey Ally! I love your topic and it seems really fun to write about. Something that you might could look into is the rise in young activists recently. There are young teenage activist now that project their voice far such as the students from Parkland and Greta Thunberg. I know that it seems vague but it would be really interesting if you could find a correlation.

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