Girls on the Verge: Debutante Dips, Drive-bys, and Other Initiations

by Vendela Vida

Overview

In a fascinating look at how young women are coming of age in America, Vendela Vida's Girls on the Verge explores a variety of rituals that girls have adapted or created in order to leave their childhoods behind.

Vida doesn't just observe the rituals, she actively participates in them, going as far as spending a week at UCLA to experience rush—she emerges a Tri-Delt. She also goes to Miami to learn about the "quince" (the Latin American celebration of a girl's fifteenth birthday), to Houston to take part in a debutante ball, to Los Angeles and San Francisco to talk to female gang members, to Salem, Massachusetts, to interview a coven of witches, and to Las Vegas to watch young brides take the plunge—some of them in drive-through wedding chapels. With humor, insight, and illuminating detail, she explores girls' struggles to forge an identity and secure a sense of belonging through various rituals—rituals that they embrace without necessarily understanding the comforts they seek or the repercussions of their often all-too-adult choices.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780312263287
Publisher:	St. Martin's Publishing Group
Publication date:	06/12/2000
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	192
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.44(d)

About the Author

Vendela Vida graduated from Middlebury College and received her MFA at Columbia University. Her work has appeared in Vogue, Jane, and other publications. She is the author of Girls on the Verge, And Now You Can Go, Let the Northern Lights Erase Your Name, and The Lovers. She lives in the Bay Area.

Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION: Sand Castles	xi
PART ONE: Family Approved	1
RUSH: Sorority Sisters	3
BIKINIS AND TIARAS: Quinceañeras	41
DIPPING: Debutantes	55
PART TWO: Going It on Her Own	77
JUST LIKE FAMILY: Gang Girls	79
SPELLBOUND: Witches	103
LOVE RECIPE: Young Brides	121
EPILOGUE: Burning Man	137
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS	173

Editorial Reviews

Vida has written a thoroughly enjoyable book . . . well-reported and entertaining.” —Kirkus Reviews

“Vida is a good writer, and clearly feels an affinity . . . with her subjects.” —Seattle Weekly

From the Publisher

In an attempt to investigate the rituals that help American girls develop their adult identities, Vida, a graduate of the Columbia University M.F.A. program, infiltrates a sorority, attends a Wiccan Sabbath and observes Las Vegas drive-through weddings, among other events. Unfortunately, the terms of her study are loosely defined (how does each ritual lead to adulthood? What distinguishes the child from the woman?), and, despite the vast body of work on adolescent behavior and the author's interviews with hundreds of girls, the book lacks sociological rigor. For example, Vida compares debutantes, young brides and gang girls without carefully considering their differences in class and race, presenting them as similar because they all yearn for a stronger sense of community. Given her subjects' age range (13 to 18) and how widely their personal circumstances vary, it is difficult to believe that they are all trying to make a dramatic leap into adulthood. Although the young women she interviews make many surprising and self-aware remarks, Vida tries too hard to portray her subjects as searching for meaning. After describing the significance of a girl's 15th birthday (quinceanera) in Cuban culture, she writes of a teenager who had photos taken but couldn't afford the large traditional party: "This is, after all, a place and an environment where pictures mean more than the truth, where a day in a young woman's life is special because photographs are taken of her various poses." While the segments on each group of girls might work as magazine pieces, taken as a whole, they don't quite coalesce. (Aug.) Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

It's been proposed that one of the reasons young people in this country have difficulty making the transition to responsible adulthood is that there are no well-defined rites of passage. But, as nature abhors a vacuum, groups of teenage girls have created their own rituals to signify leaving their childhoods behind. Vida, 27, traveled across the country and spoke with hundreds of young women age 15 and up about identity and initiation rituals. She participated "undercover" in a sorority rush at UCLA and took part in a Latin American quincenera celebration in Miami. With a "you-are-there" approach, Vida allows the reader to experience the majesty of a debutante ball, the pride of a gang initiation, the solemnity of a Wiccan ceremony, and the high hopes of a Las Vegas drive-through bride. While the book is interesting solely as a travel piece, it also offers a sociological perspective on an individual's need for affiliation, connection, and community. Recommended for all libraries, particularly YA sections.--Deborah Bigelow, Leonia P.L., NJ Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.

Library Journal

A close-up look at some of the rituals open to adolescent girls in America.

Kirkus Reviews