Slides used for my 2012 AERA paper in the symposium: 'Producing the Young Citizen in Texts of Families, Neighbourhoods, and Nations.' Images are screen shots taken from the film versions of 'The Hunger Games', 'Tomorrow When the War Began', and the Australian television soap 'Neighbours'.

1. The Girl Next Door:
Post-apocalyptic And Everyday Heroines
In Popular Young Adult Texts
Kelli McGraw
Queensland University of Technology

2. THE TEXTS:
Collins, S. (2008). The hunger games.
Scholastic
Marsden, J. (1993). Tomorrow when
the war began. Pan Macmillan
Freemantle Media (2011). Neighbours.
[various episodes]. FremantleMedia
Australia: Richmond

3. THE CONTEXT:
• The ‘girls next door’ –
Katniss
Ellie
Summer
• Popular texts with young adults
In schools; at the cinema; on
television
• Post-apocalyptic and everyday
worlds
• Different media used – very similar
stories.

4. THE HUNGER GAMES:
Texts as a pedagogical apparatus –
• Do these texts engage a feminist
pedagogy?
• Do they have ‘transformative
potential’? (Coffey & Delamont, 2000)
• Do they change dominant ways
of thinking?
• What normative assumptions are
challenged?

5. TOMORROW WHEN THE WAR BEGAN:
‘Writing it down means we might be
remembered. And by God that
matters to us. None of us wants to
end up as a pile of dead white
bones, unnoticed, unknown, and
worst of all, with no one knowing and
appreciating the risks we’ve run.’ (p.2)

6. NEIGHBOURS:
‘the model citizen at the heart of
liberal education … is being prepared
for economic, political & cultural life in
the public sphere …’ (Lynch, Lyons & Cantillon, 2007)
(e.g. Summer – passionate about equity
and social justice; goal to be a journalist;
besieged by ethical dilemmas )

7. THE ‘IDEAL’ CITIZEN?
• Obligation to family
• Reluctant heroine
• Solidarity with local
communities & beyond
• Sacrifices personal
safety/success for
the greater good

8. SIGNIFICANCE:
Straight white females…
…who all experience great suffering
and loss as a result of heroic actions.
‘to know is not enough’…? FIN