Provides the first comprehensive overview of the cultural significance of the reading practices of the girl, or shôjo, in modern and contemporary Japan and thereby invites a re-assessment of core propositions about gender norms in Japanese society.

Introduction Tomoko Aoyama and Barbara Hartley Part 1: Genealogy of the Reading Girl 1. The Genealogy of Hirahira: Liminality and the Girl Honda Masuko 2. The Genealogy of the "Girl" Critic Reading Girl Tomoko Aoyama 3. The Climate of the Girl in Yoshimoto Banana Kawasaki Kenko Part 2: Reading against Social Constraint 4. Volatility and Diversity: Shiraki Shizu and the Reading Girl Barbara Hartley 5. Ribbons Undone: The Shôjo Story Debates in Prewar Japan Hiromi Tsuchiya Dollase 6. Japanese Girls' Comfort Reading of Anne of Green Gables, Akiko Uchiyama Part 3: The Erotic Reading Girl 7. Matsuura Rieko's The Reverse Version: The Theme of "Girl-Addressing-Girl" and Male Homosexual Fantasies Kazumi Nagaike 8. Murakami Haruki's Shôjo: Kasahara Mei Maria Flutsch 9. A Girl with Her Writing Machine Rio Otomo Part 4: Reading the Performing and Visual Girl 10. Transcending Gender in Pictorial Representations of Miyazawa Kenji's "Marivuron and the Girl" (Marivuron to Shôjo) Helen Kilpatrick 11. From The Cherry Orchard to Sakura no sono: Translation and the Transfiguration of Gender and Sexuality in Shôjo Manga, James Welker 12. Girls Reading Harry Potter, Girls Writing Desire: Amateur Manga and Shôjo Reading Practices Sharalyn Orbaugh 13. Reading Lolita in Japan Vera Mackie