Powered by Girl

the long version

"A playbook for working with and training girls to be activists of their own social movements Armed with a rich array of online media platforms, seemingly endless reserves of creativity, and a keen sense of justice, girl activists are getting things done. But scholar and activist Lyn Mikel Brown knows that for every provocative news story about one "exceptional" girl out to change the world, there is a strong network of passionate adults and seasoned activists behind her. Drawing from a diverse collection of interviews with women and girl activists, Powered by Girl is both a journalistic exploration of how girls have embraced activism and a guide for adults who want to support their organizing. Here we learn about the intergenerational support behind thirteen-year-old Julia Bluhm, when she got Seventeen to go Photoshop free; nineteen-year-old Celeste Montaño, who pressed Google to diversify their Doodles; and sixteen-year-old Yas Necati, who campaigns for better sex education in the UK. And we learn what experienced adult activists like Joanne Smith of Girls for Gender Equity and Dana Edell of SPARK Movement say about how to scaffold girls' social-change work. Brown argues that adults shouldn't encourage girls to "lean in." Rather, girls should be supported in creating their own movements--disrupting the narrative, developing their own ideas--on their own terms"--