American Sweethearts: Teenage Girls in Twentieth-Century Popular Culture

by Ilana Nash

Book Overview

Teenage girls seem to have been discovered by American pop culture in the 1930s. From that time until the present day, they have appeared in books and films, comics and television, as the embodied fantasies and nightmares of youth, women, and sexual maturation.

Looking at such figures as Nancy Drew, Judy Graves, Corliss Archer, Gidget, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Britney Spears, American Sweethearts shows how popular culture has shaped...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0253218020
• ISBN13: 9780253218025
• Release Date: November 2005
• Publisher: Indiana University Press
• Length: 280 Pages
• Weight: 1.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 6.0" x 9.1"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

American History, Popular Culture, and Women's Studies collections will be enriched by this survey

Any collection strong in American popular culture and history will welcome AMERICAN SWEETHEARTS: TEENAGE GIRLS IN 20TH CENTURY POPULAR CULTURE. There are plenty stereotypes of 'stupid teen girls' and AMERICAN SWEETHEARTS gets to the bottom of these images by exploring them in American pop culture through teen narratives and the producers who created them. Chapters begin the study in 1930 and conclude in 1965, with each survey how social and cultural changes contributed to the evolving image of girls, from Nancy Drew to Gidget. American History, Popular Culture, and Women's Studies collections will be enriched by this survey. Diane C. Donovan, Editor California Bookwatch