Gabrielle Owen, assistant professor of English and women’s and gender studies at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln, will discuss her new book, “A Queer History of Adolescence: Developmental Pasts, Relational Futures,” in a virtual conversation 5 p.m. March 23 via Zoom.
“A Queer History of Adolescence” reveals categories of age — and adolescence, specifically — as an undeniable and essential mechanism in the production of difference itself. Drawing from a dynamic and varied archive, including British and American newspapers, medical papers and pamphlets, and adolescent and children’s literature circulating on both sides of the Atlantic, Owen argues that adolescence has a logic, a way of thinking, that emerges over the course of the 19th century and that survives in various forms to this day. This logic makes the idea of adolescence possible and naturalizes our historically specific ways of conceptualizing time, development, social hierarchy and the self.
Owen’s presentation is part of a series of events planned by the Department of English to mark the 50th anniversary of LGBTQ studies at Nebraska. More events will be announced in the coming months, and information is available through the special Facebook page set up for the celebration.
