Nobody Understand Me. Evil Kids in Children's Literature

Do researchers understand evil kid characters? In children's literature, the evil kid school of thought changes with history. Authors write the Puritan notion of the sinful kid school, the Lockean ignorant but educable kid, and the Romantic idealized innocent virtuous redeeming somewhat helpless kid. Modern, Postmodern, and New Sincerity "evil" kids range from bullies to baby vampires to misunderstood villains like Gregory Maguire's character Elphaba from his book Wicked: The Life and Ties of the Wicked Witch of the West (1995).

This panel examines evil children in literature. Are we seeing an increase in such representations in contemporary children's literature? Are independent rational thinkers with agency represented as evil? Do evil children have more freedom to color outside of the lines? Are actions evil, not people? Has the idea of evil changed in children's literature?

Please include academic rank and affiliation and AV requests
Please send abstracts or proposals (around 250 words) by Thursday, January 15, 2015 to Dorothy Clark (Dorothy.g.clark@csun.edu), Linda Salem (Linda.salem@yahoo.com)