ABSTRACT
This book began with reflections on my first week at the Piedmont Program for Pregnant Teens. I introduced three themes that I argue lie at the heart of the PPPT girls’ schooling experiences—the institutional force of discipline and punishment; the power of personal feelings; and the search for respect and respectability. These three themes emerged from and found expression across the girls’ self-representations. Through each form of self-representation the girls creatively answered to their social worlds and wrestled (consciously and unconsciously) with conflicting emotions regarding their transition from girlhood to motherhood. Their answers to the question, “How does it feel to be a problem?” were persistently fraught with references to self-worth, value, respectability, and a desire to control their surroundings.
