Dougy experiences personal problems that leave him feeling worthless, hopeless and socially inadequate. The first person narrative structure means our understanding of Dougy is shaped from his perspective. Dougy does not introduce himself until chapter two and the use of truncated sentences and the language with negative connotations establishes his low self-esteem and the lack of identity, ‘My names Dougy. I’m nobody much. ‘Dougy is critical about his physique, academic ability and social skills, demonstrated through the personal voice and repetition of ‘I’ and the emotive use of ‘still’ – ‘I’m the tallest kid in the whole school but I don’t like that much… I’ve always been skinny, specially my arms and legs’.…
Mia Winchell is a 13 year old girl who lives in the countryside down South with her family and her cat, Mango. Mia has a special secret that she has been hiding for 13 years. This secret keeps her apart from her classmates, her friends (including her best friend), and even her family. The book opens during the summer between 7th and 8th grade, and the story unfolds over the next few months. As she begins her final year of middle school, Mia decides that she no longer wants to keep this important detail about herself private. She decides to tell her family and friends this unusual fact about herself - that sounds, numbers, and words have color for her. Her courageous journey towards sharing this private information, as well as the responses and reactions of those around her, comprise the rest of the story.…
Scott Westerfeld’s book, Uglies takes place in a dystopian version of earth with advanced technology. Tally, the main character, is an average ‘Ugly’, a name for children/teenagers under the age of 16. Once a teenager turns 16, they go through a procedure that makes them impossibly pretty, which is the new ‘average’ look. Tally wants to be a pretty, but her friend Shay does not, due to many reasons. Shay unknowingly ruins Tally’s chance to turn pretty after escaping the city, managing to avoid the procedure. Tally’s procedure gets delayed and she is blackmailed into hunting Shay down to the place she escaped to and eventually betray her. One lesson taught through that is that when you underestimate yourself or judge yourself due to other people, your judgement can be affected by that and you can do something you could regret.…
“Part of spiritual and emotional maturity is recognizing that it's not like you're going to try to fix yourself and become a different person. You remain the same person, but you become awakened” (Kornfield). This thoughtful quote by Jack Kornfield perfectly describes the protagonist’s journey in the book Zack by William Bell. Zack was a troubled boy, confused of who he is and where he comes from, but only after he accepted himself did he really mature and saw the world in its true state. The book first introduces the protagonist as a rebellious teenager who is negligent of his marks, family, and general surroundings. The main reason for Zack’s behavior is based off of his uncertainty of his singularity. The protagonist is a rare mix of Jewish and Afro-American which causes tyrannizing in school.…
In the novel Looking For Alibrandi by marlena marchetta, Josephine Alibrandi (also known as Josie) is a typical 17 year old in her H.S.C year at St Martha’s, during the course of this year her understanding about life around her changes and so does her views on the people she loves most. Throughout the novel we see a great change in Josephine from a selfish and uncaring girl to a caring more sensitive young lady. Her life changes dramatically throughout the year as she slowly changes and learns to cope with the changes of others. Throughout this novel Josephine and her family struggles with cultural differences in Australia and acceptance into the Italian community leaving Josephine desperate to become socially acceptable within her culture, family life and school life. .…
Italian Australian Josephine Alibrandi, 17, says life has become “crazy” at this year because of the events at school especially the HSC coming up. She has been learning to resist and overcome the selfish social and racist people calling her an ethnic and wog and is dealing with controversial relationships with her mum, grandmother and her boyfriends. “It’s so nice that everyone cares and has sympathy for me even the people I hate. If it wasn’t for them I wouldn’t enjoy life at all,” says Josephine, the vice captain of St. Martha’s”…
No matter one’s career choice, family life, ethnicity, or culture, finding and owning one’s personal identity is a persistent struggle that can last an entire lifetime. One is surrounded by media and messages feigning “the perfect life” which begin to consume one’s thoughts with “what if’s” or “if only’s”. Lucy Grealy struggles with defining her self-image in her autobiography, Autobiography of a Face. Throughout Grealy’s accounts of her battle with cancer, bullies, and her self-esteem, readers get a raw, painful, yet incredibly relatable look into the elements that can contribute to self-image. In writing Autobiography of a Face, Grealy leaves readers with a chilling lesson: only readers themselves, not family, peers, the media or society, can choose how to define their lives. One must choose wisely and continually combat the world’s messages, for self-image can set the stage for one’s entire life.…
Issa Rae has always been an awkward girl; she’s always worn the wrong pants, kissed the wrong boy, and felt the wrong way, or simply been the wrong girl. The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl is a dazzling collection of essay about growing up learning to love the things in your life that makes it unique, even when those things also make it mighty awkward. She writes about being a black girl who just cannot dance, about being unhappy working in cubicle as her web series was taking off, about not arriving at a personal fashion sense, about honest, insightful, and laugh-out-loud funny and of course arrestingly awkward. One of the best books I ever read was “The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl” written by Issa Rae; it is the best because it tackles subjects like the misadventures of the internet, her being black and growing up watching television.…
The subject matter of “Destroying Avalon” is Bullying, in the form of Cyber Bullying. The themes conveyed in this text are the consequences of bullying and belonging. This helps the reader consider how bullying affects the victim and how belonging is significant in the lives of teenagers. Suicide is presented as the most impact of bullying. The result of bullying depends on the person, in this novel Avalon takes on the bullying cyberly leaving her with aggression, depression and high anxiety. “The bad feeling was threatening to overwhelm me; my stomach twisted and my skin broke out in tiny goosebumps. I clenched my fists tightly...” This quote clearly reflects how Avalon is feeling when she checked her email to see, only the beginning of what was left to come. The constant attack on Avalon on the blog, makes her feel self conscious, excluded and with the need of belonging. Belonging is depicted in this text, as Avalon a new girl has the need of belonging in her new school environment. Marshall, who is supposedly gay always feels the need to belong as he is being falsely tormented for his sexuality and just wants to be like the all the other boys. Kate McCaffrey’s choice of themes create the perfect novel for parents and teenagers to peruse to have a deeper perception of Bullying.…
Josephine Alibrandi (Josie) starts her last year of school at St Martha’s wanting to separate herself from the Italian culture and racism that she has to deal with every day. She feels as though these things are holding her back in life but throughout the book she realises that her culture is her identity and when she embraces it she experiences true freedom and she feels as though she has broken free. The book ‘Looking for Alibrandi’ is about Josie growing up and finding out who she really is and accepting herself.…
“25 Reasons to Hate My Brother Todd” is written by Peter D. Sieruta. The plot of the story is about a boy named Emery listing throughout the story, 25 reasons why he hates his brother Todd. The story is told from first person by Emery. Emery is not an average 15 year old, he dresses like a forty year old and he is much more mature than his age and stands out from all the others. When the girl Emery likes, Jodi, gets partnered up with him she isn’t very happy about it till they go to Emery’s house and she sees Todd. Jodi immediately falls in love with him and Todd likes her too. Todd asked Emery if it was okay for him to ask out Jodi, and Emery says he doesn’t like her anyways. Then Emery gets mad and puts his head down on his desk and Todd makes sure if he’s okay. Emery’s older brother Todd does things to annoy Emery unintentionally but Emery thinks he’s doing it all intentionally. The things Todd does is what an average older sibling does, but Emery thinks its just Todd acting big. From Emery’s point of view, Todd is an annoying older brother who acts big about the things he can do. From the point of view the story is told, you can tell Todd isn’t the way Emery thinks he is, he makes sure it is okay for him to ask out the girl Emery likes. When Emery disliked that idea, he puts his head down, and Todd tries to comfort him. Emery makes the list not because he hates his brother Todd for the things he lists, but to make him feel better about Todd asking out the girl Emery “loves”. Emery is jealous of his brother Todd because he is so much better than everything than him and he is more popular. It’s a common rivalry between older and younger brothers. Todd actually cares about Emery but he always takes everything Todd does in a negative way. The moral of this story is that you can’t stay mad at your family members forever, family always sticks…
Although he does struggle with the expected uncertanties of living as a mixed race teenager in a suburban town, Karim’s mixed parentage is not a taboo topic for him and as he is the narrator and focus point of the story, this encourages us, the readers, to also be comfortable with his…
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie at first seemed to be a book about belonging. The story is about the life of a teenage boy who is an outcast because of his appearance. Many people get made fun of because of how they look. This novel is titled The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian because the main character in the story is an outcast who is trying fit in at his new school. A great part of the story is about Junior trying to unsuccessfully fit in at his new school.…
Maleeka Madison, the third – 13 year old seventh grader at McClenton Middle School. “Spend[s] a lot of time trying to fit in” (p. 2), insecure about her extremely dark skin, the clothes that her mother sews for her and her tall and skinny body. Good student, and a math wiz, but teachers have noticed a change in her attitude ever since she started borrowing a classmate’s store bought clothes.…
The Film “10 Things I Hate About You” is based on a Shakespearian play. The film is about a teenage girl whose father will not allow her to date. Finally the girl’s father comes up with an idea – she can date when her older sister (Kat) does. Her Father knows that Kat is not going to date anytime soon saying “When pigs begin to fly”. The film explores many themes and issues relevant to teenagers today. Such themes include; Social Status, Expectations and Relationships.…