Chick Lit: Good, Bad, or Ugly for YA?

Chick Lit: Good, Bad, or Ugly for YA?

 

            After defining what Chick Lit is, I wanted to know whether it would be appropriate to have chick lit available for students in my classroom to read.  SO I was on a search through some book reviews and found a great article from The Hornbook Magazine in how adult chick lit has been passed down into teen lit and it might now be a good thing to have passed down…

            The article basically bashed chick lit for its “creepily photorealistic writing style” and “a value system in which meanness rules, parents check out, conformity is everything and stressed-out adult values are presumed to be meaningful to teenagers. . . . The rich are right and good simply by virtue of their wealth.” .  It drops the names of three very well known YV Chick Lit series: Gossip Girl by Cecily von Ziegesar, The A-List by Zoey Dean, and The Clique by Lisi Harrison.  In these books there are rich girls going through the ups and downs of relationships while trying to balance jobs, sports, and school.  The characters are manipulative, snotty, and down right mean.  The article gives some examples of how these books are bad for YA:

Detailed descriptions of clothes — which are named by designer and referred to as “outfits”;

Frequent mention of brand names — “so prominent you wonder if there are product placement deals,” says Wolf;

Spike heels — the higher the better;

Eyeball-rolling — as annoying in the literature as it is in real life;

Covers showing body parts but not faces — perhaps reflecting the overwhelming preoccupation with body image;

Cell phones, computers, iPods, and other electronic toys — usually to communicate the ongoing story to an absent best friend (and the reader);

Exclusive private schools — with such outré courses as “Indigenous Crafts” and a relaxed attitude toward grades and cutting classes;

Casual sex — often in semi-public places like the dressing rooms of fashionable stores;

Smoking as an indication of sophistication — an even more reprehensible model than the blow jobs, it seems to me;

Plentiful booze, but nothing so retro as beer — rather, stylish concoctions like chocolate martinis, which are not sipped but “swigged” or “gulped,” leading to

Lots of vomiting — usually on one another’s Prada bags or Gucci boots, and often in humiliatingly public circumstances;

The Party — at which there are no adults, but lots of alcohol and drugs and very loud music by named groups, and where the best scenes take place in

The ladies’ room — as a venue for malicious gossip, persecution of nerds, and sex; and, worst of all,

Clunky writing — with unbelievable situations, stereotyped characters, and awkward dialogue.

These make me want to ban YA Chick Lit from my classroom.  But as I kept reading, the article also noted that not all YA Chick Lit is like an episode of Sex & the City.  There are also many YA Chick Lit books out there that are very good for YA in that they talk about normal struggles of the average teen.  And how the ‘nerd’ wins.  I encourage everyone to read Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson and incorporate it into your classroom.  This is a great YA Chick Lit book that everyone should read. 

 

 

What is Chick Lit?

What is Chick Lit?

 

When I think of Chick Lit I immediately think of loss, love, and happy endings. One can look through the shelves of bookstores and immediately pick out some Chick Lit books based solely on their cover design. Bright neon or pastel colors with some sort of fashion item, makeup item, wedding item, or semi-sexual gesture (puckered up lips) engulf the covers. But what are some good characteristics of Chick Lit? What actually defines Chick Lit? Does it always have to do with romance or love? I chose to first stop at www.wikipedia.com to see how they defined Chick Lit.

“Chick lit” is a term used to denote a genre of fiction written for and marketed to young women, especially single, working women in their twenties and thirties. Chick lit features hip, stylish female protagonists, in urban settings (usually London or Manhattan), and follows their love lives and struggles in business (often in the publishing, advertising, public relations or fashion industry). The books usually feature an airy, irreverent tone and frank sexual themes.”

So it seemed as if I were very correct in believing that most, if not all, Chick Lit books deal with romance. So what is another definition of Chick Lit? My next stop: http://chicklitbooks.com/ .

“Chick lit is a genre comprised of books that are mainly written by women for women. The books range from having main characters in their early 20’s to their late 60’s. There is usually a personal, light, and humorous tone to the books. Sometimes they are written in first-person narrative; other time they are written from multiple viewpoints. The plots usually consist of women experiencing usual life issues, such as love, marriage, dating, relationships, friendships, roommates, corporate environments, weight issues, addiction, and much more. Chick lit is told in a more confiding, personal tone. It’s like having a best friend tell you about her life. Or watching various characters go through things that you have gone through yourself, or witnessed others going through. Humor is a strong point in chick lit, too.

This definition is very similar to the explanation from wikipedia. But after searching for some more sites about the definition of “Chick Lit” I came across some other genres that branched off of Chick Lit such as “Mom Lit” and “Teen Lit”. So Chick Lit is obviously growing and can be found in numerous languages, making it a world wide genre.

But I am still slightly unaware of how Chick Lit is different from regular women’s fiction and ‘romance’ novels? And as I kept reading on www.chicklitbooks.com I came across my answer:

“It’s all in the tone. Chick lit is told in a more confiding, personal tone. It’s like having a best friend tell you about her life. Or watching various characters go through things that you have gone through yourself, or witnessed others going through. Humor is a strong point in chick lit, too. Nearly every chick lit book has had some type of humor in it. THAT is what really separates chick lit from regular women’s fiction.”

So- now that we know what Chick Lit is, is the genre a good thing for Young Adult Readers to delve into? …to be continuted