Aimee Rickman, Adolescence, Girlhood, and Media Migration: US Teens’ Use of Social Media to Negotiate Offline Struggles. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2018, 175pp, ISBN: 1498553931, 9781498553933

Excerpt

When one considers the terms adolescence and girlhood, one might make a few assumptions. To begin, it is wholly understandable to think of adolescent girls as rebellious, disrespectful, boy-crazy, naïve, vulnerable, and addicted to their phones (or other electronic devices). It is also understandable, at least partially, to consider these assumptions in contemplating adolescence and girlhood because such is the image of female youth in US society. In Aimee Rickman’s Adolescence, Girlhood, and Media Migration, this image is critically evaluated and tied to what she calls “media migration”. The book details her ethnographic study of socioeconomically and ethnically diverse rural female adolescents in and around a small town in the US Midwest. Rickman conducted the study herself and met with 15 girls, ranging from ages 14–19, discussing with them their social lives (both on and offline), aspirations, feelings, and experiences. She then concluded that there were a few common categories within her “media migration” framework. These categories help her to build a more complete and complex model of how young girls mediate their offline experiences with their online avenues: Twitter and Facebook. Additionally, Rickman gives the reader insight into the lives of her participants with each chapter, allowing for real-life instances of each category covered in that given chapter. The result is a thought-provoking book on the constraints that US society places on young girls and how girls attempt to negotiate this limited power and respect online, as well as explicit reasons and rationales girls have for entering the online sphere and the actions they take once in it. …