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Description Many speculative fiction novels include a romantic subplot with often a paired coupling at the end. This is particularly so in YA. How can feminist writers resist or re-imagine different kinds of endings if a large sector of the reading public has been encouraged to expect romance? Is a desire for romance one of many basic human desires?
Location Assembly
Schedule Sat, 10:00–11:15 am
Panelists M: Trisha J. Wooldridge. Hiromi Goto, Lauren K. Moody
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Something I find frustrating about WisCon panels talking about romance fiction is the assumption that romance fiction, or fiction with a romance plot, is explicitly about modeling a real-life romantic relationship. I think that it can be that -- I think it often is that -- but I think romance in fiction so often plays out as an arena for self-discovery, for articulating one's own desires, for thinking about the parts of oneself that are able to be loved and valued, and what one desires and values in other people. As much as I hate badly done love triangles, a well-done love triangle is about how to know who you are and how to know what you want, and I think that's bigger and deeper than a lot of people give it credit for.
That doesn't mean that I wouldn't like to see a lot more diversity in terms of characters and relationship types in YA, because I definitely would! I don't really mind if you have a relationship between straight white able-bodied characters and you say "Oh but it's universal." I mind if you have an overwhelming majority of relationships between straight white able-bodied characters and you say "Oh but it's universal."
(I appreciate Hiromi Goto's comment about librarians, by the way, but the philosophy of public librarianship in a lot of places has swung so much towards ordering whatever is going to be popular that ideologically we almost might as well be Barnes and Noble.)
I think the question of having *healthier* romantic relationships in YA and the question of having romantic relationships not be such a singleminded focus in YA are two separate questions. (That's just panel topic drift. But really, I was more interested in the latter. I am -- sort of torn about "healthy" relationships because I think that not many teens are really that self-actualized. I think realism is a positive good and I think modeling healthy relationships is a positive good and you can't necessarily have them both at the same time. So. Complicated.)
Location Assembly
Schedule Sat, 10:00–11:15 am
Panelists M: Trisha J. Wooldridge. Hiromi Goto, Lauren K. Moody
( Read more... )
Something I find frustrating about WisCon panels talking about romance fiction is the assumption that romance fiction, or fiction with a romance plot, is explicitly about modeling a real-life romantic relationship. I think that it can be that -- I think it often is that -- but I think romance in fiction so often plays out as an arena for self-discovery, for articulating one's own desires, for thinking about the parts of oneself that are able to be loved and valued, and what one desires and values in other people. As much as I hate badly done love triangles, a well-done love triangle is about how to know who you are and how to know what you want, and I think that's bigger and deeper than a lot of people give it credit for.
That doesn't mean that I wouldn't like to see a lot more diversity in terms of characters and relationship types in YA, because I definitely would! I don't really mind if you have a relationship between straight white able-bodied characters and you say "Oh but it's universal." I mind if you have an overwhelming majority of relationships between straight white able-bodied characters and you say "Oh but it's universal."
(I appreciate Hiromi Goto's comment about librarians, by the way, but the philosophy of public librarianship in a lot of places has swung so much towards ordering whatever is going to be popular that ideologically we almost might as well be Barnes and Noble.)
I think the question of having *healthier* romantic relationships in YA and the question of having romantic relationships not be such a singleminded focus in YA are two separate questions. (That's just panel topic drift. But really, I was more interested in the latter. I am -- sort of torn about "healthy" relationships because I think that not many teens are really that self-actualized. I think realism is a positive good and I think modeling healthy relationships is a positive good and you can't necessarily have them both at the same time. So. Complicated.)