Joss Kendrick

“Joss” redirects here. For the doll, see Joss Kendrick (doll); for the book, see Joss.

Joss Kendrick

Basic Information

Full Name

[1]

Jocelyn Elizabeth Kendrick

Birth

[2]

April 14, 2010

Series Data

First Appearance

Joss

Series Location

[3] CA

Huntington Beach/Fountain ValleyCA

Family Relationships

Father

Mr. Kendrick

Mother

Mrs. Kendrick

Sibling(s)

Liam Kendrick

Dylan Kendrick

Friends or Other Relationships

Best Friend

Sofia Goto

Noted Friends and Peers

Brooklyn Tillerman
Mila
Reina

Joss Kendrick is the eighteenth Girl of the Year. She was released in 2020.

Character

Joss is a ten-year-old girl who surfs, skateboards, later participates in cheerleading, and was born with hearing loss.

Joss is fully deaf in her left ear with no ability to hear from that side; she wears a hearing aid in her right ear to assist the low level of hearing she has. Joss can lip read, which she uses to supplement her hearing aid. She often communicates with American Sign Language (ASL); this is done when she cannot hear clearly, and her whole family can also sign to communicate with her. She has adapted to her hearing loss her whole life with various methods, such as placing her phone under her pillow so the vibrations wake her (since she cannot hear the alarm ringing). Early in the morning or late at night, her hearing aid is out; she refers to this as Quiet Time/”QT”, where she can tune out the world and make everything almost quiet with sounds too blurry to process. She gets frustrated when people do not face her when speaking so she can understand what they’re saying better, or when they speak to her loudly when they learn she has hearing loss.

Joss is a surfer who has been surfing since she was six years old (she does not wear her hearing aid then, either). She considers herself a “speed demon” who aims for trying to catch air (aerial tricks) most. She also skateboards, which helps with her surfing practice, and over the course of the series takes up cheerleading. She is right-handed and “goofy-footed”, surfing and skateboarding with the right foot leading on the board and pushing with the left as her dominant.

Joss is the youngest of three and has two older brothers: Liam and Dylan. All three children are surfers, as well as their mom; their dad is a bad swimmer and doesn’t surf at all. The Kendricks live in Fountain Valley, California, and Joss is in the fourth grade at the start of the series. Her favorite athlete is Tina Hart, a professional surfer. Joss is somewhat impulsive and sometimes does not think before she acts, especially when her older brother Dylan eggs her on and she feels she must prove something to him. This can lead to her causing injuries or being injured herself.

To help her focus on tricks she is trying, she pictures them in her head, a tip from Liam to visualize her tricks to prepare to actually do them. This gets crossed at times when she starts performing in cheerleading, both for good (creating the “Victory Air”) and bad (thinking of surf tricks at cheer practice and falling off the trampoline).

Family and Friends

Family

• Mr. Kendrick: Joss’s father.
• Mrs. Kendrick: Joss’s mother.
• Liam Kendrick: Joss’s eldest brother.
• Dylan Kendrick: Joss’s second older brother.
• Murph: Joss’s female bulldog.

Friends and Others

• Sofia Goto: Joss’s best friend.
• Brooklyn Tillerman: Joss’s friend.

Books

• Face Mold: Joss Mold
• Skin: Light
• Hair: Brown
• Eyes: Brown

Collection

Trivia

• Joss is the first character in American Girl’s history to have a visible disability; this is reflected by the inclusion of a hearing aid with the doll.
• Like several Historical Characters, Joss’s creation involved a panel to assist in accurate portrayal of sports and hearing loss: Crystal da Silva, Dr. Sharon Pajka, Julie Peterson, Sara Jo Moen, Jennifer Richardson, and Bianca Valenti.
• Joss is the third Girl of the Year to have an official middle name stated, after Jess McConnell and Chrissa Maxwell.
• Joss is the second Girl of the Year character to introduce a new face mold after Jess. (While Sonali Matthews also introduced the Sonali mold, she is considered a companion character.)
• Joss’s first book (Joss) is set in May-June 2020 and include her attending school in-person and enjoying casual, crowded time on beaches with family and friends without restrictions. However–due to the COVID-19 pandemic–on March 19, 2020, California Governor Gavin Newsom and the State Public Health Officer placed the state of California under stay-at-home orders (except to get food, care for a relative or friend, get necessary health care, or go to an essential job) , which included the closure of all Orange County schools and transitioning students into distance learning by that April. Therefore Joss’s books–including the second, which continues to have open full school activities and public events–as written are factually incorrect for the year’s events. This could not have been anticipated as the books were written prior to the spread of the virus and the resulting declaration of a global pandemic. Kira Bailey’s and Corinne Tan’s books acknowledge the ongoing pandemic.

References

1. ↑Joss, pg 4: “I, Jocelyn Elizabeth Kendrick, have a need for speed.”

   , pg 4:

2. ↑American Girl Facebook.
3. ↑Joss, pg 14: “I biked after [Dylan] toward our house in Fountain Valley.”

   , pg 14: