Joshua Bright for The New York TimesEnglish country dancing at a ball during the Jane Austen Society’s annual convention, held this month in Brooklyn. Go to related article » | Go to related slide show »

Overview | What prejudices do we bring to literature? What makes an author worthy of serious study? In this lesson, students will challenge the notion that certain books are for girls and others just for boys by confronting their prejudices as they look closely at the first pages of several texts. Then, through a close reading of the first chapter of Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice,” students consider how it challenges gender assumptions and investigate its universal themes of power, money and sex.

Materials | Student journals; Copies of the first chapter of “Pride and Prejudice”, and the first pages of “To Kill a Mockingbird” or “The House on Mango Street” and “Bridget Jones’s Diary” (Note to teacher: This last selection contains references to drinking and sex, so preview its content before sharing with students.)

Warm-Up | Distribute the first pages of “Pride and Prejudice,” “The House on Mango Street” or “To Kill a Mockingbird” and “Bridget Jones’s Diary” without telling students where they came from or who wrote them.

Ask students to read through each page and label each as either a “boy book” or a “girl book” — that is, a book that they feel might appeal more to boy readers or girl readers. Next, ask them to discuss the reasons behind their choices. Then, ask students how an author’s style affects their desire to read a text. Ask: Do we think of 19th century literature as “girly”? Why or why not? What about novels in general? What about Shakespeare?

After this conversation, reveal the titles of the books and the fact that each of these books is written by a female and has a female protagonist. Ask students: If this is the case, why label some books for girls and some for boys? If you are familiar with these books, which did you enjoy most? Did the label matter?

Next, ask students to begin by listing the works they remember reading as part of their English curriculum over the past two years in their journals. Invite students to share their lists and record titles on the board. As a class, reflect on this list. Ask:

1. How many of these works were written by women?
2. How many by men?
3. Which ones feature female protagonists?
4. Which ones feature male protagonists?
5. Which ones, if any, would you classify as “boy” stories? Why? What characterizes them?
6. Which ones, if any, are “girl” stories? Why? What characterizes them?
7. How do you react when you are assigned a book by or about a woman? Why?
8. What is “chick-lit”? Why do many people have certain expectations of women’s stories?

Explain to students that “Bridget Jones’s Diary” is thought to have begun the “chick-lit” movement. Ask students to brainstorm elements that might define the genre, based on this example. Ask: Are these only women’s issues? Why do you think this term has come to be seen as dismissive? Are there “boy stories” and “girl stories,” or are there simply “human stories” worthy of study no matter who wrote them?

Related | In “Lots of Pride, a Little Prejudice,” Jennifer Schuessler introduces Times readers to the Jane Austen Society of North America by describing its annual meeting, held this year in Brooklyn. She describes the scholars who spoke on the meeting themes of power, money, and sex. NovelistAnna Quindlen was among them.

But it was the novelist Anna Quindlen who set the tone for the weekend with a rousing keynote address lamenting two centuries of male condescension to Austen’s seemingly small domestic dramas.

“It burns me that there were only men at the funeral,” Ms. Quindlen said, noting that Austen’s gravestone at Winchester Cathedral made no mention of her books. She also recalled another man who wanted to bury Austen, a professor at Barnard in the ’60s who dismissed Austen as a “a second-tier novelist” — something he wouldn’t say now, Ms. Quindlen said, even if he were probably still thinking it.

It was an insult that the overwhelmingly female audience, some of whom hissed at Ms. Quindlen’s mentions of Jonathan Franzen and “the dismissive label chick-lit,” seemed to take personally. Austen, in fact, had many early male champions, and the term “Janeite” — coined by the critic George Saintsbury in 1894 — was embraced by male fans like Rudyard Kipling, who wore it with pride. But in the 20th century it came to be applied to the “wrong” kind of reader: overly effusive, academically untrained and often female.

Background Vocabulary | Read the entire article with your class, then answer the questions below. You may wish to introduce students to the following words, names or concepts before reading: Regency, reticule, Cornel West, Leo Strauss, Jonathan Franzen, Rudyard Kipling.

Questions | For discussion and reading comprehension:

1. What differences does the writer note between the inaugural gathering of the Jane Austen Society of North America and this year’s event?
2. What does Anna Quindlen lament in her keynote address?
3. How is the label “chick-lit” used dismissively here? What does the writer illustrate with this quotation?
4. How do Austen fans demonstrate their ardor at the event?
5. Who makes up the majority of the attendees?

Activities | We suggest two activities below, the first an offshoot of the warm-up on questions of gender assumptions about literature, and the second intended for those conducting a deeper inquiry into the worlds of Jane Austen’s novels.

Activity No. 1: In Chapter 6 of her novel Persuasion, Austen herself notes the differences in what “boys and girls” prefer to think about:

The Mr. Musgroves had their game to guard, and to destroy, their horses, dogs, and newspapers to engage them; and the females were fully occupied in all the other common subjects of housekeeping, neighbors, dress, dancing, and music.

Tell students that they are now going to look more closely at the text of “Pride and Prejudice” to examine the ways in which it might speak to humans in general, not just women or men.

Have students return to the first chapter of “Pride and Prejudice” with a pen in hand. Using pink and blue markers, crayons, pencils, or highlighters to play up this notion of gender and reading, ask students to read the chapter closely, highlighting anything that seems to them to be “girly” in pink and anything that might appeal more to boys in blue.

Once students have finished, ask them to point to details in the text that seem particularly to appeal to readers of one gender or the other. Encourage students to (politely) challenge one another’s contributions. Then help them look beyond these details by asking the following questions:

What are some books that defy this kind of characterization? “The Giver”? “Hunger Games”? “Harry Potter”? These are all by female authors; what makes them O.K. for both boys and girls?

During this discussion, engage students in thinking about the fact that the first line is about a man and that the entire chapter is an equal exchange between a married couple about their daughters’ prospects. If we see this as women’s literature only, then what does that say about the role of men in family life? Does it discount men?

Joshua Bright for The New York TimesAttendees arrive at the annual convention of the Jane Austen Society of North America, held in Oct. at the Brooklyn Marriott, where lecturers like Cornel West discussed the meeting’s themes of power, money and sex. Go to related article » | Go to related slide show »

Activity No. 2:Here is another close reading idea for the “Janeites” who wish to engage students in a serious study of themes Austen tackles and, in doing so, challenge the opinion of her as simply a writer for “the wrong kind of reader”. This could be done as a follow-up activity to the one presented above, but it also stands on its own.

As the article explains, the theme of this year’s annual meeting was “power, money and sex.” Ask students to write briefly in their journals about the relationships among these three ideas today. When they have finished, open discussion with that same prompt: What are the relationships among power, money and sex today? Then ask, Are these serious themes worthy of serious readers? What great literary works can you name that are about these themes?

Next, ask students what they know about the relationship between power, money and sex during Jane Austen’s lifetime. Have them list what they know in a KWL chart on the board. Then, lead them in creating questions they have about power, money and sex in Jane Austen’s England.

Student will then use these questions as the starting point for researching the sociocultural and economic context of Austen’s work in order to better understand the worlds of her books. Students can start with the Times Topics page on Jane Austen. This page contains links to several helpful Web sites, including JASNA and the Republic of Pemberley. In addition, the Victorian Web provides useful information not only on Austen, but for the Regency period.

After they have completed enough research to answer their initial questions, have students create a Popplet or other kind of infographic to display the information they have gathered in such a way as to show what they’ve discovered about the interplay among power, money and sex during Austen’s time. Have students present their completed graphics to the class.

Then, have students return to the first chapter of “Pride and Prejudice” with a pen in hand, annotating as they read for any detail that connects to power, money and sex. They’ll soon notice that almost everything in this chapter does connect to one of these in some way. Discuss their observations to these questions:

1. What do you notice about power, money and sex in the first chapter of “Pride and Prejudice”?
2. What information from your research is reflected in this chapter?
3. How are the relationships among these themes similar to and difference from those that exist today?
4. In what ways does Austen’s work comment on these themes?
5. How is her writing relevant for modern readers?
6. Is Austen an author who should be studied in school? Why or why not?

Going Further | If students are familiar with the work of Austen, ask them to write a scene from a modern-day comedy of manners meant to engage both female and male readers by subverting ideas about what makes a “boy book” or “girl book” or by addressing power, money and sex in the modern day.

To illustrate this concept, you might show an students the trailer from Clueless and explain to them that this was a modern reimagining of Jane Austen’s “Emma”. You could then brainstorm as a class the different ways they might update Austen’s world. Instead of sending letters, for example, characters might text one another.

Or, go the other way and invite students to bring to life the world of Jane Austen (or any other novelist) the way the Jane Austen Society of North America does. They can “let their Jane Austen freak flag fly” by dressing in costumes, drinking or eating foods or performing dances of the era, or they might write papers or deliver talks about the relevance of this author to contemporary society.

A third option: Students could choose several texts as a class that they or others have categorized as “boy books” or “girl books” and read and discuss them in literature circles. As they read, ask students to keep a reflective journal in which they consider their experience of the book in light of this lesson. Ask them to think about the following questions:

1. Why did you initially dismiss this book as suitable for only one gender?
2. What details in the story seem to confirm your initial impulse?
3. What details challenge this idea?
4. What about this story makes it compelling for readers of both genders?

Common Core ELA Anchor Standards, 6-12

Reading
1. Read closely to determine what the text says explicitly and to make logical inferences from it; cite specific textual evidence when writing or speaking to support conclusions drawn from the text.
2. Determine central ideas or themes of a text and analyze their development; summarize the key supporting details and ideas.
4. Interpret words and phrases as they are used in a text, including determining technical, connotative and figurative meanings, and analyze how specific word choices shape meaning or tone.
9. Analyze how two or more texts address similar themes or topics in order to build knowledge or to compare the approaches the authors take.
10. Read and comprehend complex literary and informational texts independently and proficiently.

Writing
3. Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, well-chosen details, and well-structured event sequences.
4. Produce clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization and style are appropriate to task, purpose and audience.
5. Develop and strengthen writing as needed by planning, revising, editing, rewriting or trying a new approach.

Speaking and Listening
1. Prepare for and participate effectively in a range of conversations and collaborations with diverse partners, building on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly and persuasively.
2. Integrate and evaluate information presented in diverse media and formats, including visually, quantitatively and orally.

Language
1. Demonstrate command of the conventions of standard English grammar and usage when writing or speaking.