Queer studies and Young Adult Literature

[Izzie2104]

Hi folks! I need some help. As you all know, applying to a school for a (funded) PhD in Literature, you need to find faculty that are in your area of interests. I am interested in Queer Young Adult literature, but only found a professor from UT Austin who focuses on Young Adult Literature. I googled everywhere and could not find any faculty that explicitly says they work with Queer Young Adult Lit (except the professor from UTA). I need help. How do I find faculty that fit my interests in Queer/Multi-cultural Young Adult Literature? Thanks!

 

[Glasperlenspieler]

6 minutes ago, Izzie2104 said:

How do I find faculty that fit my interests in Queer/Multi-cultural Young Adult Literature?

Find books and articles on the topic. Keep a list of the authors, and figure out where they're at, who their advisors were, and who their advisees are, and where they're all at. Then read the bibliographies and acknowledgements pages, trace down those works and authors and repeat the process. Once you get to the point when the relevant books and articles being cited are by people you've already looked into, you're starting to come full circle and should have a decent idea of who's who in the field.

[onerepublic96]

Everything @Glasperlenspieler said. Also, just throwing this out there, but you might not necessarily need to find a prof who works specifically in the YA lit branch of queer studies/theory/lit. Finding a queer studies prof who tackles some questions similar to yours, uses methodology that is interesting to you, etc. might just be enough. I'd regroup, look at programs that lean strongly into into queer studies or departments that have lots of people working in the area, go through each prof's research statement, see what they've been writing about and what courses they've been teaching, and determine if any of these things resonate with your own research interests. 

[Bopie5]

Seconding @Glasperlenspieler on this--that's a great place to start.

Also, the first person who came to mind (for me) when you mentioned multicultural YA lit was Ebony Elizabeth Thomas at Penn. Obviously, Penn isn't taking anyone in Arts & Sciences this cycle. But if you're waiting on applying, she might be a good person to keep in mind. Her book The Dark Fantastic could be a great starting place to find more YA lit scholars. She definitely focuses more on race in YA lit than queer theory, but YA lit people in general are harder to find than say, a Shakespearean or a 19th C Americanist. So just as @onerepublic96 suggests finding queer studies scholars and looking for intersections from there, you could also find a YA lit scholar and go from there. 

[sarahchristine]

Marilisa Jimenez Garcia at Lehigh works with Latinx children's/young adult literature, though not queer studies (but there's also a professor - Mary Foltz - who does queer studies). 

[cassidyaxx]

On 9/24/2020 at 7:02 PM, Bopie5 said:

Seconding @Glasperlenspieler on this--that's a great place to start.

Also, the first person who came to mind (for me) when you mentioned multicultural YA lit was Ebony Elizabeth Thomas at Penn. Obviously, Penn isn't taking anyone in Arts & Sciences this cycle. But if you're waiting on applying, she might be a good person to keep in mind. Her book The Dark Fantastic could be a great starting place to find more YA lit scholars. She definitely focuses more on race in YA lit than queer theory, but YA lit people in general are harder to find than say, a Shakespearean or a 19th C Americanist. So just as @onerepublic96 suggests finding queer studies scholars and looking for intersections from there, you could also find a YA lit scholar and go from there. 

Seconding Ebony Elizabeth Thomas, she is amazing. Since Penn isn't taking people though, I'd like to give a shoutout to UConn's faculty. There are several well known facullty working in YA lit, one of whom is Kate Capshaw who is actually friends with Ebony Elizabeth Thomas. She does AfAm lit and Children's lit. Two others are Victoria Ford Smith and Anna Mae Duane. They are worth looking into, and UConn also has enough faculty working in queer lit that it may be a good fit for you.