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Something I've been thinking about in relation to all the convos about if YA is skewing too old, is how many chronically-ill/disabled teens have different adolescent experiences. I frequently felt much younger because it seemed like I was missing out on the *teenage experience.*
We need to talk about how it's a privilege to, as a teen, *be* a teen. Whenever these conversations come up, we push aside experiences of teens who have to take on responsibilities that we usually equate with adulthood, and thankfully authors are discussing that on here...
But I've seen hardly any authors engaging in this discourse bring up how we're erasing the experience of (for lack of a better term/character limits) being forced to remain in pre-teen stasis because your body doesn't allow you to move forward in the way society deems typical.
That's not to say we shouldn't be talking about the former. We need to talk about BOTH.
Tl;dr
There's no one teen experience.
BUT that doesn't mean all teens who have a different experience are represented by YA feeling/skewing older. See: many chronically-ill/disabled teens!
Tl;dr
There's no one teen experience.
BUT that doesn't mean all teens who have a different experience are represented by YA feeling/skewing older. See: many chronically-ill/disabled teens!
