The pleasure narrative: sexual agency and teen feminism in young adult fiction

Research Doctorate - Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)This submission includes a novel and exegesis exploring connected issues of adolescent sexual desire, bodily empowerment and teen feminism. My novel is the story of a young woman (and her mother) coming to terms with the big changes that take place in the time between finishing school and leaving home. In writing this novel, I wanted to provide a place for girls to explore varied forms of desire and to present a protagonist who was specific about her desires, and who possessed an active sexual agency that unashamedly referenced her own body and the object(s) of her desires. I wanted her to have confidence about what she could do with her body (or not) and it was my intention to be specific about how she experienced pleasure. The exegesis addresses two distinct but related issues: the first looks at how adolescent female desire is portrayed (or not) in Young Adult fiction and what literary and cultural critics say these representations reveal about our culture; the second issue explores how an emerging groundswell of young feminists are responding to social and individual issues of bodily empowerment and how this is reflected in what could be viewed as a growing field of contemporary Young Adult feminist fiction. Ultimately, the exegesis asks several questions: How is it possible to portray adolescent female desire in a culture that ignores or contains the wanting of young women? How do we promote a clearer sense of sexual agency without the muddied messages of commodified empowerment? And finally, how do we remove judgment and promote a healthy representation of adolescent girl desire