| dc.description.abstract | Young adults meet different challenges in school and society, where bullying and poor life quality affect the understanding of identity development. Therefore, our thesis will focus on how English teaching at secondary school can contribute to healthy identity development amongst pupils based on the interdisciplinary topics ‘health and life skills’ and ‘democracy and citizenship’ from LK20. Our research focuses on two texts containing LGBTQ+ topics. The Black Flamingo by Dean Atta and Heartstopper Volumes 1 and 2 by Alice Oseman are texts where the reader follows the identity development of two protagonists. The texts describe challenges pupils can experience in society, proving the relevance of the usage of these kinds of books in English teaching. Our aim is to research how identity theory can contribute to a healthier understanding of identity development by using texts where pupils can discuss and learn about diversity, and accept differences between individuals, in addition, they learn to respect and tolerate these differences in society. Furthermore, we will use the theories of windows and mirrors, place identity, gender intelligibility, Maslow’s Pyramid of Psychological Needs, and previous research which we used to inspire our research.
Our research will perform textual analysis, focusing on discourse in the texts. We will conduct a close reading of the texts and use graphic analysis (Heartstopper Volumes 1 and 2) and poetry analysis (The Black Flamingo). Excerpts from the texts are discussed considering theories and learning aims from the interdisciplinary topics to prove that these texts can contribute to higher competence in interdisciplinary topics, that the texts can be suitable in English classrooms, and affects healthier identity development. | |
