Important factors visible in research about girls living under problematic life circumstances is their experiences of bullying, the late detection and the invisibility that seems to surround them (se Berglund 1998). Drawing upon data from a qualitative interview study on the life stories of girls living under problematic life circumstances, the aim of this paper is to examine agency through the concepts of adjustment and resistance in narratives concerning girls’ experiences of bullying. The central questions include: How is agency visible in the girls stories about school and bullying, especially in relation to social structures such as gender and class? How can we understand their space of agency in relation to the concepts of adjustment and resistance?

     The theoretical framework in this paper takes its point of departure in the concept of agency (McNay 2001, 2007). Agency refers to the possibilities for a girl to act and react and also to choose in relation to a specific context, but the possibilities to act and choose are not equally shaped or available for all girls. In this paper, agency will therefore be situated in a broader context that considers the space of agency, the effects of structures of domination, power and marginalization (McNay 2001; Bohman 1999). 

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