Routledge Companion to Girls' Studies

Sharon R. Mazzarella, PhD, is Professor of Communication Studies at James Madison University, United States. Her research takes a critical/cultural approach to interrogating mediated representations of youth, particularly girls and girlhoods. She is the author of Girls, Moral Panic, and the News Media: Troublesome Bodies (2020, Routledge).

"In this collection, Mazzarella (James Madison Univ.) brings together scholars from across disciplines to consider a range of topics pertaining to girls' studies globally—e.g., education, media representations, sexuality, race, and religion, among others. As the contributors note, girls are not fragile; rather, they are often empowered to be phenomenal women. However, reaching this state requires support and resources to enable girls to forge a path forward into adulthood. Chapters speak to diverse populations of girls, ranging from resilient to at-risk, and mark how these young women can become strong and adaptive. The authors have an affinity for them, demonstrating through their research how impactful and resourceful girls can be as they develop into young women. This significant study is a formidable primer for practitioners working with young girls."- Diann E. Cameron-Kelly, Associate Professor and Chair of the School of Social Work, Adelphi University, USA

• Introduction PART ONE: What Can Girls’ Studies Be? 1. Girl Power and Its Afterlife: Neoliberalism and the Invention of Girlhood Studies 2. Girls’ Studies and the Humanities: Recognizing Human-as-Girl 3. For the Love of Black Girls: Building Black Girlhood Studies as a Lifejacket 4. Listen Up: Trans Girls, Trans Girlhoods, and Trans Girl Joy 5. Girlhood Studies: The First Fifteen Years 6. Reflecting on the Development of Girlhood Studies in Israel 7. Polaroid Possibilities: Immanent Girlhood and the Tangle of Temporality 8. Looking Forward: The Future of Girls’ Studies PART TWO: Who is the “Girl” in Girls’ Studies? 9. A Decolonial Approach to Leadership and Activism with Girls with Disabilities across Southern Spaces: Creating Spaces for Inclusion from Within 10. Girls’ Digital Citizenship Elsewhere 11. Kitab vs. Hijab: Muslim Girls Regenerating Politics in India 12. Funding Girls’ Activism: Cooptation, Feminism, and Institutional Change 13. Girls Fighting for the Planet: Climate Activism as Caring Intimate Counterpublics 14. “Girls Can’t Do This Alone”: Understanding Girls’ Agency During Adolescence in Nine Countries 15. Adolescent Girls’ Migration in the Global South: Moving into Adulthood 16. Girls In Deprived Areas – Place, Violence, and Femininity 17. Visibilizing Quinceañeras as Generational and Ethnic Bridge: Flashpoints of Latina Girlhoods PART THREE: Representing Girls and Girlhoods 18. Representing Queer Girlhoods in 2020s Australian Film and Television 19. Dare to Dream: Family, Ambition, and Girlhood in Post-Millennial South Asian Cinema 20. Reimagining Girlhood in Contemporary Malaysian Youth Literature 21. “What It Feels Like for a Girl”: Exploring Girlhood in a Jamaican Context through Olive Senior’s "Do Angels Wear Brassieres?" 22. “Work, Sleep, Make Money”: Girlboss Memes, Feminine Precarities, and the Endurance of the “Problematic” Girl 23. The Internet of (Feminist) Girls: Re-reading Gendered Internet Histories 24. (Re)visiting a Girl Revolution: Riot Grrrl Zines, Liminality, and Anarcha-Feminism 25. The Erasure of Counter-Stereotypical Female Characters from Disney’s Transmedia Toys: Exploring Toy, Media, and Audience Tensions 26. Celebrity Girls’ Studies: Interdisciplinary Scholarship on Fame, Girlhoods, and Identity PART FOUR: Bodies, Sex, and Sexualities 27. Black Girls’ Adultification in South America as a Contemporary Case of Crimes Against Humanity 28. The Sexual Health of Adolescents in Uganda: When Restricting Sexual and Reproductive Health Programs is All About Girls 29. Crush-Tastic: When Girls Encounter Sexually Explicit Materials 30. Talking with Girls about Porn 31. Junior Fiction Magazines as a Means of Sex Education: Examining Yoshida Toshi’s The Castle of Venus 32. "God is Always Watching You, Capeesh?": Satirizing Religion and Empowering Girls' Sexuality