Review of: Petrochemical Fantasies: The Art and Energy of American Comics , Daniel Worden (2024) Columbus, OH: Ohio State University Press, 212 pp., ISBN 978-0-81421-570-8, h/bk, USD 99.95
Review of: In Visible Archives: Queer and Feminist Visual Culture in the 1980s , Margaret Galvan (2023) Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 317 pp., ISBN 978-1-51790-324-4, p/bk, USD 28.00
Review of: Voices From Nepal: Uncovering Human Trafficking Through Comics Journalism , Dan Archer (2025) Toronto, Buffalo and London: University of Toronto Press, 234 pp., ISBN 978-1-48755-501-6, h/bk, USD 29.95
This article aims to analyse the graphic production of Lelia Bicocca, a political activist who was kidnapped and disappeared in 1977 during the last Argentine military dictatorship. The pages with cartoons produced by Bicocca during her imprisonment in the clandestine detention centre ESMA (Escuela Superior de Mecánica de la Armada ‘Higher School of Mechanics of the Navy’) survived and were recovered many years later. We argue that this graphic testimony – ‘Il Capuchino’ – is not only exceptional for its characteristics and context but also holds significant importance in the reconstruction of memory in Argentina. Using concepts from the fields of memory studies and comics studies, we propose to review the plot of the history of these drawings and what place these objects occupy in the reconstruction of memory in Argentina.
Review of: The Cambridge Companion to Comics, Maaheen Ahmed (ed.) (2023) Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 410 pp., ISBN 978-1-00925-568-4, h/bk, £75.00
Review of: Muslim Comics and Warscape Witnessing, Ezra Mirze Santesso (2023) Columbus, OH: The Ohio University Press, 218 pp., ISBN 978-0-8142-5884-2, p/bk, $34.95
Review of: A Cultural History of the Punisher: Marvel Comics and the Politics of Vengeance, Kent Worcester (2023) Bristol and Chicago, IL: Intellect, 274 pp., ISBN 978-1-78938-858-9, p/bk, $39.95
This graphic essay explores the intersection between comics and environmental psychology. Reviewing previous scholarship, we first turn to the thematic and structural resonances between these two spheres. Among the former, sometimes called the 'literal' approach, is the insight that funny animals are an entrenched feature in many comics. The second or formal approach sees the comics medium itself as an ecosystem whose different parts (images and words) interdependently create a whole. We continue with three examples of how insights from environmental psychology resonate with the process of reading comics. The first example relates to the copresence of clashing voices in a comic, when text and image are in tension with each other, a situation akin to cognitive dissonance. The second aspect concerns sequence and its discontents. In comics, we take in different panels
This article foregrounds the graphic style of Vietnamerica. It analyses how certain artistic decisions within the work's dominant graphic style that emphasize place and space ground the reader in the narrative and lead to the redefinition of refugee space as 'Vietnamerica'. In contrast, the use of multiple graphic styles in this work, or 'polygraphie' (after Thierry Smolderen), takes the reader out of the narrative through graphic citations to Socialist Realist propaganda posters and Herg & eacute;'s Tintin comics. The use of these graphic citations challenge dominant 'image-texts', and they highlight the mediated nature of the histories within the work. This article's attention to graphic style fills a gap in the existing comics studies scholarship about Vietnamerica, which typically emphasizes narrative themes of family, history, identity and war, but sometimes does not pay as much attention to how analysing the marks on the page, rather than only what they represent, can contribute to the interpretation of the work.
Comics rely on the act of closure not only to invoke the perception of continuous action but also to produce meaning. And while the act of closure is an integral part of the comics experience (and, thus, analysis), it is still a very ambiguous term, mostly because the very phenomenon is still being researched. The objective of this investigation was to examine how the act of closure suggests action and meaning. To achieve set goals, the author conducted an open-ended survey study where 143 participants provided their experiences after reading a segment of the comic book. The findings confirm the importance of closure for the overall reader's experience and suggest that immersion strongly correlates with the juxtapositional artist's ability to stimulate readers to create meaning about comic book characters' inner emotional status and thoughts.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine in the spring of 2022 sparked worldwide calls for empathy and solidarity with the Ukrainian people. In Sweden, many artists, authors and activists answered this call with performances, productions and other forms of public demonstrations. The publication of 'Report from Ukraine', by two Ukrainian cartoonists, was one such response. The comic follows the authors' perspective on the lead-up to, and start of, the events of February 2022. In the current article, we look at how Swedish teenagers (n = 91) in upper secondary school (aged 18-19) explore the message of 'Report from Ukraine' and how these students construct and critique ideas around solidarity and otherness through the visual and textual means of the comic. Analysing video observations of 25 small group discussions, the study discusses students' empathic responses to the comic. The findings reveal how the pupils form an emotional alliance with the Ukrainian characters based on their suffering and the similarities the students draw to their own lives. Furthermore, empathy with Ukraine is also intertwined with antipathy for Russia and the comic's depiction of Russian soldiers.
This article aims to analyse the graphic production of Lelia Bicocca, a political activist who was kidnapped and disappeared in 1977 during the last Argentine military dictatorship. The pages with cartoons produced by Bicocca during her imprisonment in the clandestine detention centre ESMA (Escuela Superior de Mec & aacute;nica de la Armada 'Higher School of Mechanics of the Navy') survived and were recovered many years later. We argue that this graphic testimony-'Il Capuchino' - is not only exceptional for its characteristics and context but also holds significant importance in the reconstruction of memory in Argentina. Using concepts from the fields of memory studies and comics studies, we propose to review the plot of the history of these drawings and what place these objects occupy in the reconstruction of memory in Argentina. Delivered by Intellect to:
Quan Zhou talks about her work and role as an activist in this interview. She discusses the evolution of her work, from comedic autobiographical gags to more solemn and narrative-oriented stories. With autofiction being the category that best describes her stories she is asked about why it helps her tell stories and why she thinks that it is so prevalent in today's contemporary narrative. Living in New York during the time of the interview, Zhou talks about her experience being the first racialized person to ever be selected for the King Juan Carlos I chair in Spanish culture and civilization at New York University (NYU). The interview also brings to the forefront topics such as the need for representation and empathy, tokenism in the cultural industry, the use of humour as opposed to serious narratives, the impact of her work in the Chinese community in Spain and how she sees herself in the Spanish contemporary landscape. She delves into the idea of self-representation and the problematic dilemma of what is expected artistically from a racialized creator. For Zhou, art is about emotions and being true to herself, but always with a political and activist framework that allows her to convey a message.
Review of: The Rise of the Graphic Novel: Computational Criticism and the Evolution of Literary Value, Alexander Dunst (2023) Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, xiv + 240 pp., ISBN 978-1-00918-293-5, h/bk, £85.00
This publication features a creative presentation of findings from interviews conducted with Barbara Brandon-Croft, the first African American woman to have a nationally syndicated newspaper comic strip in the United States, Where I'm Coming From (1989-2005). This article begins with an introduction to the historical contributions of women and Black American cartoonists. Afterward, it presents a detailed overview of (Barbara's father) Brumsic Brandon, Jr.'s works as an activist, animator, cartoonist and television personality on numerous concurrent projects. Next, a similar review of Barbara Brandon-Croft's accomplishments is offered. These results are part of a study that answers the following research questions: (1) how do stereotypes influence social interactions and communications amongst media industry professionals and stakeholders? (2) How have the social experiences, professional training and educational backgrounds of media industry professionals informed the choices they make in their specific roles within the media industry? The feature comic focuses on findings about Barbara's formative years and incorporates them into the narrative and illustrations. It serves as a preview of a graphic history book project that focuses on early moments in cartoonists' lives. This book will illustrate the backstories that changed each cartoonist's subjective world-view. It will reveal how these pivotal moments caused them to form beliefs that influence their reactions to stereotypes, their choice to tackle or avoid stereotypes and their decisions concerning how to use or portray stereotypes in their media projects.
This editorial introduces this double-length Special Issue, which collects proceedings from an open call for submissions held after the thirteenth iteration of the International Graphic Novel and Comics Conference held in July 2022 at the Lexicon Library and Cultural Centre, Dún Laoghaire, just outside Dublin, supported by Bournemouth University’s Women’s Academic Network, the Institute of Art, Design and Technology and the Creative Futures Academy. This event examined how contemporary challenges to conscience, ethics and responsibility prompt us to think about comics texts and representations, as well as considering how to approach or rethink debates and conflicts within comics studies itself. It summarizes the Special Issue content and identifies key themes that emerge in relation to discourses of gender and sexuality, including queer politics, questions of intersectionality and race, and the multivalent concept of the monstrous.
This article examines Drawing Power, a collection of autobiographical comics about ‘sexual violence, harassment, and survival’, with contributions from more than sixty comics creators from a variety of racial, sexual, cultural and social backgrounds, edited by American underground cartoonist Diane Noomin and published by Abrams Comic Arts in 2019. I argue that the accumulation of stories from Drawing Power seems to rely on a logic of familiarity – as the attackers are familiar figures such as family members, friends, neighbours and co-workers, who assault women in familiar environments such as the home or the workplace in dishearteningly similar ways – that counters the potential risk of inadvertently suggesting that such acts are inevitable and unpreventable. Against this background, a few stories introduce self-representations of the survivors of sexual assault as monstrous figures, while perpetrators remain ordinary people whose deeds are often facilitated by either social complacency or complicity. This article examines the effects of the conjunction of the familiar and the monstrous in the context of several testimonies about sexual violence. For this purpose, I am in conversation with feminist scholarship on the gendering of violence and intimacy, with work on how perpetration is facilitated by ‘implicated subjects’, as well as scholarship on monstrosity and femininity.
This article examines fascinating, yet not widely researched, forms of graphic storytelling located at the intersection of comics studies, feminism, autobiography and the medical humanities, namely comics devoted to pregnancy, childbirth and motherhood. I focus on two contemporary Polish autobiographical comic books, Agata Nowicka’s Projekt: Człowiek (‘Project: A human being’) (2006) and Olga Wróbel’s Ciemna Strona Księżyca (‘The dark side of the moon’) (2014). Torn between their roles as ‘bodies’ and their personal and professional aspirations and needs, both authors visually conceptualize their pregnant selves as unstable, multiple and serial. They document and reflect on their state, trying to negotiate their subjectivity in and through the medium of comics. Nowicka conceptualizes her pregnancy as a ‘project’, something she will complete within a specified period of time. The metaphor of the project is bittersweet. On the one hand, it points to the excitement associated with completing a creative task – something that reinforces her role as a creator. On the other hand, it also points to the insecurities and fears associated with being a freelance artist (i.e. lack of social and financial security during and after pregnancy). Respectively, Wróbel attempts to draw ‘the dark side of the moon’, the dark side of her pregnancy, including weight gain, haemorrhoids, skin problems, anxiety and depression. Indirectly, both comics also engage in sociopolitical critique, commenting on/representing the experience of childbirth in Poland.
In this interview, Michael Connerty speaks with Emil Ferris about the creative process, the healing power of art and comics’ facility for dealing with trauma and horror. The interview took place shortly before the publication of Ferris’s My Favorite Thing Is Monsters, Book Two, a book that encompasses a wide range of themes, including gender and sexuality, familial dynamics and intersectional politics.
