Colleen Mondor at Chasing Ray has inspired another interesting discussion about teen girls and reading. This time, Colleen asked us panelists to discuss how important it is (or isn’t) for writers to identify with their protagonists. Specifically, she asked:
Do you think writers and publishers address this identity issue strongly enough and in a balanced manner in current teen fiction?
Can authors write characters of different race/ethnicity or sexual preference from their own?
Beyond that, what special responsibility, if any, do authors of teen fiction have to represent as broad a swath of individuals as possible?
You can read the thoughtful responses of Colleen’s WAGW Panel here.
I tackled the question from a non-fiction point of view, of course, and only the issue of identifying with my subject as an author. I also linked over to a similar discussion that was started at the I.N.K. (Interesting Nonfiction for Kids) blog. If you feel strongly on these topics, do stop by and join in the discussions.
In the meanwhile, I’m rubbing my hands together in anticipation of reading three new titles in Houghton Mifflin Harcourt’s Scientists in the Field series. Together these books share the work of five scientists, among them a female microbiologist/spelunker and an African American biologist:
