We all grew up with fantastical Young Adult literature with mind-blowing protagonists, like Harry Potter, that changed the way we dreamed and influenced the way we experienced the world.\u00a0 But why is it that when a series\u2019 main protagonist is female, she can never stand on her own, must engage in a heteronormative relationship, and exploit her femininity?<\/p>\n
One of the hottest Young Adult series of 2011 was Suzanne Collins\u2019 The Hunger Games. Our heroine Katniss Everdeen, a sixteen-year-old girl living under a totalitarian regime in a post-apocalyptic North America, exemplifies extraordinary characteristics we are awed by as readers. She sacrifices herself, taking the place of her sister, to participate in a modernized version of a gladiatorial tournament called the Hunger Games. As a televised reality show, the Games force twenty-four children to fight to the death as means of entertainment for the capitol city citizens. Surviving the Games is all about strategy, and for Katniss that means appealing to the viewers as a female.<\/p>\n
Katniss\u2019s sexuality is the central focus of the audience watching at home. From the very beginning, she must rely on the exploitation of her gender for all it\u2019s worth. Her trainer constantly tries to make her more feminine and desirable to win her sponsors. When presented to the audience for the first time, Katniss\u2019s beauty is what instantly earns her praise and adoration. Her team doesn\u2019t even try to present her as a strong, capable contender\u2014the only thing that matters is her portrayal of the feminine ideal.<\/p>\n
Not only is her appearance a constant focal point, but Katniss is also obligated to fake a romantic interest in her fellow competitor, Peeta. Pretending to be hopelessly in love with him, Katniss garners sympathy from the viewers, encouraging them to supply resources essential to her survival. At one point, she even plays out the clich\u00e9d \u2018wounded-solider-delicate \u2013nurse\u2019 sequence to nurse Peeta back to health after he is injured during the course of the Games.<\/p>\n
For the entirety of the story, Katniss holds Peeta\u2019s life in her hands\u2014as she is a more capable competitor. One would assume that this demonstrates the pro-feminist agenda of the Hunger Games, but it\u2019s the way in which Katniss must rely on Peeta\u2019s survival to ensure her own survival that makes a difference. Katniss is constantly put into situations that strip her of her freedom to make her own decisions. The book repetitively demonstrates that Katniss has few options as a woman to survive the Games. Were Peeta\u2014or any young male character for that matter\u2014the protagonist of this tale, a romantic relationship\u2014even fake romance\u2014would never be essential to his survival. Marketing a Young Adult literature series about a boy being in love would not, in all likelihood, sell many copies.<\/p>\n
This isn\u2019t to say that the Hunger Games<\/em> is a book with a sadistic, anti-feminist agenda\u2014because Katniss is a strong and likable character. But it says something about our culture when the leading girl of a New York Times<\/em> best-seller is saved by her feminine appeal and reliance on gender roles. For the sake of future generations of YA readers, we should take a stand against this stereotypical portrayal of female characters, and change the way we define what it means to be a strong female character\u2014or rather what it means to be a strong character, period.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" How are females portrayed in Young Adult literature? Meg Roy takes a closer look at the Hunger Games and explores the difference between being branded \u201cstrong female character\u201d\u2014or just a strong character.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":43,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[239,235],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-425","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-culture","category-vol-4-issue-1"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/community.scrippscollege.edu\/invisible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/community.scrippscollege.edu\/invisible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/community.scrippscollege.edu\/invisible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/community.scrippscollege.edu\/invisible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/43"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/community.scrippscollege.edu\/invisible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=425"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/community.scrippscollege.edu\/invisible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/425\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/community.scrippscollege.edu\/invisible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/community.scrippscollege.edu\/invisible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/community.scrippscollege.edu\/invisible\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}