"The Outsiders" by S.E. Hinton

The Outsiders novel is reputably known to be covered in YA classrooms. The novel centralizes around many different themes that relate to YA students. Because of this, The Outsiders is an excellent novel to integrate into the English curriculum, specifically for YA classrooms. In a way, The Outsiders can be considered under the category of a Bildungsroman. We witness the protagonists struggle to make sense of out of life’s difficulties, specifically difficulties adolescents may struggle with. 

The setting of the novel takes place in Oklahoma during the 1960s. There are many main characters in the book, but Ponyboy Curtis is our narrator. The main characters of the book are segmented into two different groups known as The Greasers and The Socs.  Ponyboy, our narrator, is a part of the greaser group, along with his brothers Sodapop and Darry, Johnny, Steve and Two-Bit. The Greasers are considered to be a group of kids belonging to a lower class of social rank. The Socs, which are the Greasers’ rivals, belong to an upper-class social rank. Rivalry between social class and cliques is a major theme in the novel, where we see the main characters conflict with a power struggle of which group is better. There is also a bit of a Romeo and Juliet conflict between Pony boy and Cherry (one of the girls from the Socs). We see that these two really like each other, but there differences seem to get in the way, because of the prejudices against their groups. We see conflict between the two groups escalate and physical fights begin to happen. The physical fights get out of hand and we see a character getting murdered by his rival. Pony boy and Johnny come across the Socs at the park and the Socs start a violent fight, suffocating Johnny under the water fountain, and beating up Johnny. Pony boy blacks out, and out of fear, Johnny kills Bob(one of the Socs). Shocked from what just happened, both Pony boy and Johnny flee to an abandoned church in hopes that the police and the other Socs won’t find them. Johnny begins to feel guilty and thinks about turning himself in.  Just as he decides to go back into town, the church goes up in flames with schoolchildren caught inside. Both Johnny and Ponyboy save the kids, but they end up getting hurt, Johnny especially who ends up in critical condition. Johnny doesn’t survive, and Dally who is so upset about Johnny’s death runs off and robs a grocery store out of anger. The greasers try to find Dally but by the time they found him, the police had already found him. Dally takes out his gun and points it to the police, and the police end up gunning him down. Again, Ponyboy loses conscious. Ponyboy wakes up at home and and the doctors order him to stay in bed. This final scene depicts the brothers reconciling and healing from their past pain. Considering everything that has happened, Sodapop asks Darry and Ponyboy to stop fighting. This final scene depicts the brothers reconciling and healing from their past pain, while at the same time, realizing the value of family. 

The title, “The Outsiders” is perfect for the novel because it represents the struggle of feeling left out; feeling like an outsider. This struggle is highly relatable to students, which is why this novel is a great resource to use in the classroom. As far as social rank in relation to YA students, we see two different types of social classes here; lower class and upper class. Depending on the reader, students can make connections with their own class, and see how these two classes treat one another. Themes such as friendship, fitting-in, violence, family, and rivalry are of high-interest to YA students. The novel portrays realistic situations and their consequences, where students can connect their own experiences and even learn from the mistakes the characters in the novel make. 



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Vocabulary

reputably: considered to be good or acceptable usage

adolescents: young persons who have not reached full maturity; teenagers

conflict: disagreement; fight or battle

prejudices: unreasonable feelings, opinions, or attitudes, regarding a racial, religious, or national group.

suffocating: not being able to breathe

conscious: having the mental faculties active

reconciling: forgiving

relatable: (relate) to have a connection with

portrays: to show in words

consequences: instances of following something as an effect, result, or outcome.

Grammar Point:A syllable is a unit of organization for a sequence of speech sounds. For example, the word water is composed of two syllables: wa and ter. 

Grammar Exercise: How many syllables are in each vocabulary word?

1. reputably

2. adolescents

3. conflict

4. prejudices

5. suffocating

6. conscious

7. reconciling

8. relatable

9. portrays

10. consequences.