CFP: Journal of Graduate Research in Young People's Materials and Culture

Call For Papers

Journal of Graduate Research in Young People’s Materials and Culture (JGR)

Based at the University of British Columbia the Journal of Graduate Research in Young People’s Materials and Culture (JGR) is a peer-reviewed open-access e-journal publishing graduate student research in the areas of children’s and young adult literature, childhood studies, and cultural studies related to children and young people.

We are currently selecting manuscripts for our winter 2013 issue. Papers on any children’s or young adult genres are welcome as are papers that discuss other children’s materials such as film, virtual texts, or graphic novels. Possible paper topics could include but are not limited to:

• The child or young adult as explorer/explored, navigator/navigated
• Navigating (or negotiating) identity, gender, sexuality, race, ethnicity or religion as a child or young adult in an adult world
• Literary trends such as the history/future of children’s texts
• Pathways of adaptation such as literary translations of texts to film, games, merchandise, graphic novels, or online spaces
• Exploring place and spaces of childhood or adolescence
• Cultural, physical, psychological, ideological, or literary restrictions and barriers to exploration and imagination
• Childhood and adolescent development as it pertains to literature, new materials, other modalities
• Children, young adults, and cross-cultural exposure

JGR accepts article submissions by current and recent graduate students relevant to the field of children’s and young adult literature and materials. All submissions will be peer reviewed. To ensure an objective peer review process please submit personally identifying content (such as your biographical sketch and contact information) as a separate document attached to your submission.

Submissions must be completed original manuscripts not submitted elsewhere, written in English, 5,000 – 8,000 words (including Endnotes and Works Cited), and should conform to the MLA Handbook, 7th edition. Please submit essays electronically along with a 150-word abstract and 50-word biographical sketch via Word attachments to jgr.submission@yahoo.ca or online through the OJS system at http://ojs.library.ubc.ca/index.php/ypmc/index.

Deadline for submissions is 15 February 2013. Publication is scheduled for late 2013.

For more information, visit the journal’s website at http://ojs.library.ubc.ca/index.php/ypmc/index
You may also contact the editors Karen Taylor karen.taylor@alumni.ubc.ca or Robert Bittner rob1@sfu.ca.

Books for Halloween Time

As a child I enjoyed the occasional spooky story, but the dark and haunting features did not capture my imagination until much later in life. Instead, I am not (entirely) afraid to admit that my favorite "Halloween" book as a young kid was Garfield's Halloween Adventure. A lover of lasagna? And sleeping? On a mission to collect all the candy, candy, candy, candy possible? Who wouldn't relate? So yes, I have fond memories of flipping through my comic adventure every year, the colorful and friendly illustrations carrying me through with humor into a haunting ghost story. Year after year, until that one pivotal moment when my family moved in high school and the box with nearly all my childhood books happened to disappear (that my mom won't admit to having donated them to this day remains a touchy subject).

Nevertheless the memory remains, and that shall suffice (until I end up buying it again out of nostalgia). For now, I will entertain myself with some of popular haunting/scary/Halloween-themed books compiled by the Kid You Not Podcast and BlogHer. These offer a delightful selection from rhyming, humorous picture books to spooky, macabre novels for older kids. In a time where the grotesque has really made its mark with the prevalence of zombies, end-of-the-world rhetoric and violence, turning to books that favor the "creepy" and "haunting" aspects of storytelling can be favorable and refreshing, especially for younger audiences. And who doesn't love a witch trying to find room on her broom for everything?

from WJACTV.COM, excerpt

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

High school juniors write book for young tornado victims

By Melanie Gillespie

CAMBRIA COUNTY, Pa. —

It has been almost a year since a tornado ripped through the town of Joplin, Missouri leaving a trail of destruction in its path.

One local school district did something for an elementary school whose students lost everything.

This was much more than any class project. A literature class of 11th graders decided to write, illustrate and print a children's book for kids at Irving Elementary in Joplin just in time for Christmas.

"And it was just something… Wow, these kids lost so much. We can give them something," junior Eden Mullins said.

"It started with a big idea, and then we realized how much work we were taking on," American Literature and Composition teacher Melissa Vello said.

Nearly 15 students and their teacher wrote Feather of a Friend in the matter of 15 days. They donated extra time to writing and revising it, and raising enough money to print at $4 a copy.

It taught students and instructors a lesson that you can't always learn from a textbook.

"I really saw how valuable the experience was for [all] of us, and we've all learned so much from it, and [I] think that's what education should be," Vello said.

"[It's] something I can actually look back on and say I'm really glad I did that, and it wasn't just for me," Mullins said.

"This is a real world thing. We helped these kids in need out, you get sort of an experience from that, you just can't get from anything else," another student said.

The kids from Irving Elementary got their copy the day before Christmas break. The students and teacher agree that this is something they would like to do in class every year.