Notice Board

The Institute for Child and Youth Studies invites you to join us for a discussion with Dr. Dawn Sardella-Ayres on "Girls' Literature as Genre: Canadian and American Girls' Coming-of-Age Stories" 

When: Monday, February 10,  11:30 a.m.

Where: C450

Speaker: Dr. Dawn Sardella-Ayres

Scholars have discussed girls' books and girls' literature critically for decades, yet relatively little work has been done on defining girls' literature as a distinct and unique genre of its own. Dawn Sardella-Ayres explores the ways that girls' books in America and Canada--from Little Women to Anne of Green Gables and more-- can be defined, and how they are used to demonstrate the ways in which a certain kind of girl comes of age in fiction. What do the heroines of these "classic books for girls" reflect back to the world of their times, and to our world today? 

Dawn Sardella-Ayres received her PhD from the University of Cambridge in 2016. Sardella-Ayres has published on Alcott, Montgomery, Johnston, and Wilder, and researches issues related to gender and race performativity, as well as the Kunstlerroman, in late nineteenth- and early twentieth century girls’ texts. Her current critical work explores girls’ literature as a distinct genre, rooted in theories of genre as social action. She co-hosts Hollins University's Girls’ Literature Reading Group with her writing partner Ashley Reese, and is the LM Montgomery Institute’s 2023-2024 Research Associate.

 Light refreshments will be served. All are welcome.