The Child and the Maniac: Unsettling Discourses of Childhood Sexual Innocence in Ian McEwanâs Atonement

Lucy Hopkins

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The Child and the Maniac: Unsettling Discourses of Childhood Sexual Innocence in Ian McEwanâs Atonement

In: Negotiating Childhoods

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Lucy Hopkins

Lucy Hopkins
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Type:: Chapter

Pages:: 141â150

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1163/9781848880467_015

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Discussions of childhood sexuality are often highly contentious and ethically loaded, as they are caught up with ideas of innocence and abuse. In this paper, I explore the ways in which elisions between sexual abuse narratives and discourses of childrenâs sexualities work to reinscribe discourses of childhood sexual innocence and limit potential discussions of alternative possibilities for childrenâs sexualities. I examine the ways in which Ian McEwanâs 2001 novel, Atonement, works to untangle the elisions between childhood sexuality and discourses of childhood innocence. I argue that the novelâs questioning of the normalisation of childhood sexual innocence raises important questions about the ways in which we represent- and discursively constitute - childhood sexuality.

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Negotiating Childhoods

E-Book ISBN:: 9781848880467

Publisher:: Brill

Print Publication Date:: 08 May 2010

Subjects
- Philosophy
  - General
- Social Sciences
  - Cultural Studies
  - Youth & Adolescence

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The Child and the Maniac: Unsettling Discourses of Childhood Sexual Innocence in Ian McEwanâs Atonement

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Negotiating Childhoods

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The Child and the Maniac: Unsettling Discourses of Childhood Sexual Innocence in Ian McEwanâs Atonement