Contesting Childhood: Autobiography, Trauma, and Memory
by Kate Douglas
The late 1990s and early 2000s witnessed a surge in the publication and popularity of autobiographical writings about childhood. Linking literary and cultural studies, Contesting Childhood draws on a varied selection of works from a diverse range of authorsùfrom first-time to experienced writers. Kate Douglas explores Australian accounts of the Stolen…
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Overview
The late 1990s and early 2000s witnessed a surge in the publication and popularity of autobiographical writings about childhood. Linking literary and cultural studies, Contesting Childhood draws on a varied selection of works from a diverse range of authorsùfrom first-time to experienced writers. Kate Douglas explores Australian accounts of the Stolen Generation, contemporary American and British narratives of abuse, the bestselling memoirs of Andrea Ashworth, Augusten Burroughs, Robert Drewe, Mary Karr, Frank McCourt, Dave Pelzer, and Lorna Sage, among many others.
Drawing on trauma and memory studies and theories of authorship and readership, Contesting Childhood offers commentary on the triumphs, trials, and tribulations that have shaped this genre. Douglas examines the content of the narratives and the limits of their representations, as well as some of the ways in which autobiographies of youth have become politically important and influential. This study enables readers to discover how stories configure childhood within cultural memory and the public sphere.
Product Details
- ISBN-13:
- 9780813546643
- Publisher:
- Rutgers University Press
- Publication date:
- 01/21/2010
- Series:
- The Rutgers Series in Childhood Studies
- Pages:
- 236
- Product dimensions:
- 6.00(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.70(d)
Table of Contents
Introduction Constructing Childhood, Contesting Childhood 1
1 Creating Childhood: Autobiography and Cultural Memory 19
2 Consuming Childhood: Buying and Selling the Autobiographical Child 43
3 Authoring Childhood: The Road to Recovery and Redemption 67
4 Scripts for Remembering: Childhoods and Nostalgia 84
5 Scripts for Remembering: Traumatic Childhoods 106
6 Ethics: Writing about Child Abuse, Writing about Abusive Parents 131
7 The Ethics of Reading: Witnessing Traumatic Childhoods 150
Conclusion: Writing Childhood in the Twenty-first Century 170
Notes 181
Works Cited 195
Index 211
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