Amplifying Female Voices: AP and honors English curriculums should include more female-written books to enrich students’ perspectives

Three books.

Throughout my three and a half years of high school, only three of my AP and honors English class-assigned books have been written by women. Three books. In over three years — the other 11 books being male-written.

In order to add a fourth book to this list, I had to use one of my choice reading books because the curriculum won’t. 

Simply put, I’m frustrated.

It’s hard when AP and honors English classes preach the ideas of inclusivity and representation when the books can’t even accurately represent my female classmates. English classes should include more female-written books in the curriculum to broaden students’ perspectives.

At this point in my high school career, I believe I’m an expert in analyzing and interpreting books written from the male perspective, with female characters that are often stereotypical and underdeveloped. I’ve spent the last three years doing nothing but skipping over these static female characters to analyze the character arcs of the male characters. Women aren’t just housewives and shallow lovers — but that’s how we’re depicting women to a growing generation.

Including female-written novels just in the choice outside reading project list is not the solution. Giving students the choice once every semester to possibly read a female-led book is not representation. It’s lazy. 

The curriculum needs to allow time for the whole class to read the novels that will introduce a multitude of new perspectives to narrow-minded high schoolers.

I’m tired of reading books like “A Separate Peace” by John Knowles or “Lord of the Flies” by William Golding that offer the same envious and vengeful male narrative I’ve been reading my whole high school experience.

Including books like “Wuthering Heights” by Emily Brontë or “Mrs. Dalloway” by Virginia Woolf in the curriculum would bring both female voices and female main characters — which the department is in desperate need of.

Since freshman year, my English classes have consisted of a majority of girls and yet we still only choose the “classics” that are all written by men. There are classics written by women too. That’s not an excuse anymore.

Obviously, I’m not saying to get rid of the male perspective entirely — I’ve enjoyed valuable stories like “Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger and “A Thousand Splendid Suns” by Khaled Hosseini — but there’s a noticeable gap in representation in all English grade levels. It’s time to bring these classes to the 21st century and let the female voice be heard.