Designing the Teenage Girl

The Debut of a Popular Character

AvMary Celeste Kearney

Häftad, Engelska, 2026

354 kr

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Beskrivning

Explores the forgotten first wave of American teen-girl entertainment from the late 1920s through the early 1950s.During the mid-twentieth century, American entertainment featuring teenage girls blossomed. From short stories to plays, films, comics, radio programs, and television shows, writers and other creative professionals developed a new character type that helped to define midcentury girlhood and teen culture. Designing the Teenage Girl uncovers the largely forgotten first wave of US teen-girl entertainment, tracing its emergence in the 1920s through a thirty-year production cycle that spanned all sectors of American popular culture.Beginning with short stories such as Sally Benson's Junior Miss and following their adaptations, Kearney reveals how teen-girl narratives circulated across industries. Drawing on archival research and analysis of visual, narrative, and sound design, Kearney situates these texts within the identity politics of the period. While midcentury teen-girl entertainment privileged white, middle-class femininity, it also contained alternative visions of girlhood that complicated heteronormative and patriarchal expectations. This study reframes the origins of teen-girl entertainment and demonstrates how its aesthetic strategies and industrial practices continue to shape representations of girlhood today.

Produktinformation

Utgivningsdatum:2026-12-15
Mått:152 x 229 x undefined mm
Format:Häftad
Språk:Engelska
Antal sidor:296
Förlag:University of Texas Press
ISBN:9781477335970

Utforska kategorier

Kulturvetenskap inom Samhälle och politik
Genusvetenskap inom Samhälle och politik

Mer om författaren

Mary Celeste Kearney is a professor of film, television, and theatre at the University of Notre Dame. She is the author of Girls Make Media and Gender and Rock and editor of The Gender and Media Reader as well as two volumes of Mediated Girlhoods: New Explorations of Girls' Media Culture and The Craft of Criticism: Critical Media Studies in Practice.

Recensioner i media

"Mary Celeste Kearney makes a crucial intervention into both transmedia history as well as teen media studies and the study of girlhoods. In this new work, Kearney's dedicated scholarship and incredibly broad range of research perspectives show a researcher at the top of her field with a command of both theoretical and historical foundations." - Barbara Jane Brickman, author of Suffering Sappho! Lesbian Camp in American Popular Culture "Designing the Teenage Girl fills a void in our understanding of how the modern figure of the girl evolved into the form she takes in popular media today. Mary Celeste Kearney is the leading authority in girls' media studies, and her thoroughly researched and well-written book will be required reading not only for girlhood studies scholars but also for media scholars interested in transmedia texts." - Kristen Hatch, author of Shirley Temple and the Performance of Girlhood

Innehållsförteckning

List of IllustrationsPrefaceIntroductionChapter 1. Writing the Teenage Girl: Teen Narrative Design and the New "New Girl"Chapter 2. Redesigning the Teenage Girl: Transindustrial Adaptation and the Evolution of a StereotypeChapter 3. Teen-Girl In/Visibility: White Design and Black SpectralityChapter 4. A Second-Floor Room of Her Own: Production Design and Teen-Girl SpaceChapter 5. Swinging Teens: Music Design and Teen-Girl SoundscapesConclusionAcknowledgmentsAppendix A. Short Story CompositesAppendix B. MetapropertiesAppendix C. Theatrical AdaptationsAppendix D. FilmsAppendix E. Radio BroadcastsAppendix F. Television ProgramsAppendix G. Comic Book SeriesAppendix H. Music in Films and Radio SeriesNotesIndex