Foster Care Experiences in Youth Literature: Literary Analysis Provides Insights into How Young People Talk About, Comprehend, and Internalize the Phenomenon of Foster Care

Child Abuse & Neglect, Volume 54, April 2016

Public discourse around how society ought to react to cases of child maltreatment has often focused on how child protection agencies do, could, and should respond to cases of child maltreatment. Practice and theory issues around removing children from their homes, placing them in foster care, and providing services to families are broadly discussed in the media, in trade publications, and in academic literature. Less commonly discussed, however, are how these themes inter-sect with the experiential accounts of children and young people who have lived with the reality of maltreatment or who have had personal contact with the child protection system.