Can reading be an act of resistance?

Amy Krug, senior lecturer of English at the University of Dayton, examines this.

Amy Krug is a senior lecturer at the University of Dayton. She specializes in the scholarly study of popular romance novels, particularly how romance novels function in community. With her students, she is developing a popular romance collection in the University’s library that currently includes over 100 books.

Reading Romance As An Act of Resistance

Did you know something you may already be doing could be an act of resistance?

That “something” is reading popular romance novels. Those novels people feel like they should hide when they read. Novels traditionally considered “trashy” or “smutty.”

Reading the genre is perhaps as controversial as ever. Because of the diverse heroes and heroines, some consider the genre to be pushing a liberal agenda. Even that once-ubiquitous cover model with flowing locks and bulging biceps, Fabio, dismissed current romances as “woke” in an interview. Additionally, multiple books from the romantasy series A Court of Thorns and Roses often end up on yearly top 20 banned books list. And in case you were wondering, “romantasy,” a mashup of “romance” and “fantasy,” really is a word – though it may not show up in Webster’s Dictionary (yet).

Romance novels have the largest sales numbers of the adult genre fiction market. Readers already know the books are a way to open public conversation about queer issues, racism, disability, body acceptance, and other minority subjects. These topics are the same topics many banned books deal with. While once considered too cisgender, white, straight, and abled-bodied, in the last 10 years, the genre has exploded with representative characters. For example, the popular fantasy series The Fourth Wing focuses on a disabled heroine, while Get a Life, Chloe Brown, the first of a contemporary series, focuses on a disabled, plus-size woman of color.

Reading books that include these topics, and intentionally expanding readership, is a way to resist the current trend toward the national legal and social de-emphasis of diversity and women’s rights. So the next time you pick up a romance novel, think about what it says about who gets to be seen — and how it reflects, and contradicts, the larger question of representation.

Read More:

[eCommons UDayton] – Romance Novels

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