Saving the Day at NeMLA

I am pleased to announce the presenters for our NeMLA 2020 session:

Saving the Day: Accessing Comics in the 21st Century (Roundtable)
Organized by Michael A. Torregrossa, Independent Scholar, and Carl B. Sell, Oklahoma Panhandle State University

Krazy in the Klassroom: Teaching Early Newspaper Comics
Jonathan Najarian, Boston University

Finding Frankensteins (and Other Illustrated Classics): Resources for Research and Teaching
Michael A. Torregrossa, Independent Scholar

Pirate Booty: Scholars and Scanned Comics
Charles Henebry, Boston University

Affordability, Access, & Flexibility in Teaching Comics in the 21st Century
Lance Eaton, University of Massachusetts Boston

Graphic Medicine Online
A. David Lewis, MCPHS University

Educating the Total Nerd: Resources for Using the Products of Fandom in the Classroom
Michael Dittman, Butler County Community College

Saving the Day Update 10/3

My thanks for the submissions received so far for the Saving the Day: Accessing Comics in the 21st Century round table.

We do now have a viable session, but one or two more presenters would help make the panel really great.

EXTENDED DEADLINE CFP Saving the Day: Accessing Comics in the Twenty-first Century (A Roundtable) (10/7/19; NeMLA Boston 3/5-8/2020)

Call for Papers for Saving the Day: Accessing Comics in the Twenty-first Century (A Roundtable)

51st Annual Convention of the Northeast Modern Language Association

Boston Marriott Copley Place, in Boston, Massachusetts, from 5-8 March 2020

DEADLINE EXTENDED: Paper abstracts are due by 7 October 2019

Session organized by Michael A. Torregrossa, The Medieval Comics Project, and Carl B. Sell, Oklahoma Panhandle State University

Although the presence of physical comics has declined, the plethora of comics-based movies and television shows available to contemporary audiences has made it almost impossible for an individual not to have acquired a familiarity with the comics medium and some of its most recognizable characters. Even more so than past generations, our students are especially responsive to superheroes and related tropes of comics, but what are the best ways to bring this material into the classroom to illustrate both where the comics are today and where they’ve come from?

In response to these questions, this session will introduce and instruct participants in the use of various online tools (such as comics companies’ websites, comics sellers’ store sites, databases of comics, fan wikias, and repositories) to successfully find and access comics and information about them of value to our teaching and research. This objective is especially vital, as resources like the Grand Comics Database and its various search options, can be invaluable when looking for resources (particularly when paired with repositories of comics, like Comic Book +, comiXology, DC Universe, and Marvel Unlimited). Furthermore, instruction on the various forms of the comiXology, DC Universe, and Marvel Unlimited platforms are of great importance as they stand to revolutionize access to and distribution of comics in the twenty-first century by providing affordable digital editions of books from all eras of the medium’s history. Additionally, fans of the comics have produced important resources essential in any quest to track and understand the larger contexts involved in how comics have developed and their characters evolved; these include various wikis devoted to specific publishers (like the DC Database and the Marvel Database) and sites like The Appendix to the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe. Finally, Comics Studies is a thriving field of scholarship with many print and online resources available. Unfortunately, all of these new resources appear foreign to most educators. We hope that this session will change that and promote a greater awareness of the resources available to successfully integrate comics into our academic lives.

This session is a roundtable, in which 3-10 participants give brief, informal presentations (5-10 minutes) and the session is open to conversation and debate between participants and the audience. The direct link for this session is https://www.cfplist.com/nemla/Home/S/18042. Please contact the organizers at SavingtheDay2020@gmail.com with any questions or concerns.

Abstract submissions must be made through NeMLA’s official site. Applicants will need to login or create an account at https://www.cfplist.com/nemla/Home/login. Submissions must begin with a paper title of not more than 100 characters (including spaces) and adhering to the following: capitalize titles by MLA formatting rules unless the title is in a language other than English; do not use quotation marks in the session title or abstract title itself but please use only single quotation marks around titles of short stories, poems, and similar short works; italicize the titles of long works mentioned in the paper title; and do not place a period at the end of the title. Submissions should also include an academic biography (usually transferred from your NeMLA profile) and a paper abstract of not more than 300 words; be sure to italicize or use quotation marks around titles according to MLA guidelines. Please be aware that NeMLA membership is not required to submit abstracts, but it is required to present at the convention. In addition, note that it is permissible to present on (1) a panel (or seminar) and (2) a roundtable or a creative session, but it is not permissible to present on a panel and a seminar (because both are paper-based), on two panels or two roundtables (because both would be the same type). Further information on these and other policies can be accessed at http://www.buffalo.edu/nemla/convention/callforpapers/submit.html. Chairs will confirm the acceptance of abstracts before 15 October 2019. At that time, applicants must confirm the panel on which they wish to participate. Convention registration/membership for 2019-2020 must be paid by 1 December 2019.

News of CFP Saving the Day for Medievalists: Accessing Medieval-Themed Comics in the Twenty-first Century (Roundtable) (9/15/19; Kalamazoo 5/7-10/2020)

In related news, the Medieval Comics Project is sponsoring a session for next year's International Congress on Medieval Studies. The full details on the call for paper can be found on the Making Medievalisms Matter site at https://medievalinpopularculture.blogspot.com/2019/08/cfpsaving-day-for-medievalists.html.

Paper proposals are due by 15 September 2019.

Thanks for your support of our endeavors.

CFP Journal of Anime and Manga Studies Inaugural Issue (8/31/19)

Journal of Anime and Manga Studies Inaugural Issue
https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2019/06/25/journal-of-anime-and-manga-studies-inaugural-issue

deadline for submissions: August 31, 2019
full name / name of organization: The Journal of Anime and Manga Studies (JAMS)
contact email: animestudiesjournal@gmail.com


Inaugural Issue to be Published in Early 2020

The Journal of Anime and Manga Studies (JAMS) is excited to announce a CFP for its inaugural issue! JAMS is an open-access journal dedicated to providing an ethical, peer-reviewed, interdisciplinary space for academics, students, and independent researchers examining the field of anime, manga, cosplay, and fandom studies to share their research with others. JAMS is peer reviewed by scholars with experience in anime and manga studies.

This is an exciting time for anime and manga studies as a discipline, with courses on the subject appearing at universities like Yale and the University of California, Berkeley. The Journal of Anime and Manga Studies hopes the works submitted to and published within our first issue can spark further conversations about the deeper meanings, understandings, and/or cultural significance of anime, manga, cosplay, related media, and their fandoms, what anime and manga studies can be as an area of study, and the types of interdisciplinary work that can come out of analyzing anime, manga, cosplay, related media, and their fandoms from a variety of scholarly perspectives.

Because of this goal, JAMS aims to publish scholarly analysis of anime through any number of theoretical lenses. From the sociocultural/historical context of anti-war arguments in the films of Hayao Miyazaki, to the representation of queer characters in anime like Yuri!!! on Ice and Classmates, to the implications of communal identity and character performance in the cosplay world; JAMS is interested in diverse viewpoints and ideas on what can be explored in this area of study. Included in this interest specifically are works involving qualitative and quantitative, data-driven research surrounding anime, manga, cosplay, and their fandoms. Pieces published in JAMS will reach an interdisciplinary audience and should be written free of jargon. Scholarly book reviews of texts concerning anime, manga, cosplay, related media, and fandom culture surrounding these areas will also be considered.

All papers published in JAMS are published with a Creative Commons license, Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0).

Ideal submissions to JAMS are between 4,500 and 7,500 words. Please contact the editor if you wish to discuss longer or shorter submissions.

Please visit our site: https://iopn.library.illinois.edu/journals/jams/about, for information about the journal and our policies. We welcome inquiries and are glad to discuss ideas for potential submissions. Scholars interested in supporting anime and manga studies as a discipline as peer reviewers should also reach out to JAMS. Inquiries can be directed to animestudiesjournal@gmail.com.

Submissions will be accepted until August 31st, 2019.


Last updated June 26, 2019

CFP The Impact of American Superheroes around the World (9/30/19; NeMLA 2020)

The Impact of American Superheroes around the World (NeMLA 2020)
https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2019/06/05/the-impact-of-american-superheroes-around-the-world-nemla-2020

deadline for submissions: September 30, 2019
full name / name of organization: Northeast Modern Language Association
contact email: rponcecordero@keene.edu

No one escapes Marvel’s Endgame: the economic and cultural impact of the past few decades’ boom in superhero movies, and more broadly superhero narratives, is evident well beyond the boundaries of the United States. In fact, the presence and influence of American comic-book superheroes abroad started shortly after the debut of DC's Superman in 1938, and has been growing ever since.

This session welcomes abstracts considering, among other objects of study,

• international emulations of the genre (such as Canada’s Nelvana of the Northern Lights, Britain’s Marvelman, the Philippines’ Durna, Israel’s Sabraman, Kuwait’s The 99, Chile’s Mirageman, Nigeria’s Guardian Prime, Pakistan’s Burka Avenger, France’s Ladybug, or South Africa’s Kwezi),
• looser adaptations (Mexico’s Santo and the lucha libre filmography in general, Japan’s Ultraman, China’s The Heroic Trio, Argentina’s Cybersix, India’s Krrish, Russia’s Black Lightning), 
• critical parodies (France’s Astérix, Mexico’s Chapulín Colorado, Spain’s Superlópez, Finland’s Peräsmies, Japan’s Zebraman, Malaysia’s Cicak Man), 
• unofficial appropriations (Italy’s Three Fantastic Supermen, Turkey’s 3 Dev Adam, India’s Superman, the Philippines’ Alyas Batman en Robin), 
• as well as influences on art style and narrative structure (Japan’s One-Punch Man and My Hero Academia) in both comics and audiovisual media.

Please submit a 300-word abstract and brief biographical statement by September 30, 2019 directly through NeMLA's system: https://www.cfplist.com/nemla/Home/S/18069

The 51st Annual NeMLA Convention will take place in Boston, MA on March 5-8, 2020.


Last updated June 5, 2019

CFP The Marvel Cinematic Universe: Examining a Post-Endgame World (9/30/19; NeMLA 2020)

The Marvel Cinematic Universe: Examining a Post-Endgame World
https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2019/06/06/the-marvel-cinematic-universe-examining-a-post-endgame-world

deadline for submissions: September 30, 2019
full name / name of organization: Lindsay Bryde / Northeast Modern Language Association
contact email: Lindsay.Bryde@gmail.com


This roundtable will be looking holistically at perspectives on the first 22 films in the MCU. This arc will be brought to completion with Avenger’s Endgame. Now would be a good time to look back and assess which gambles have worked and/or failed now that a narrative arc has been completed. Participants are encouraged to consider the MCU both as a whole as well as specific franchises under the overall banner. 

The conference is through the Northeast Modern Language Association and will take place March 5-8th, 2020 in Boston, MA

Submissions are due: September 30, 2019

NeMLA uses a user-based system to process abstract submissions. Interested scholars should submit 250-word abstracts to Lindsay Bryde through the NeMLA website using the link below: https://www.cfplist.com/nemla/Home/S/17913

For questions about the new submission system, you can contact NeMLA web support here: websupport@nemla.org.

Questions specific to the roundtable can be sent to Lindsay.Bryde@gmail.com



Last updated June 7, 2019

CFP Comics and Education (Spec Issue of Studies in Comics) (11/1/19)

Studies in Comics - Special Issue on Comics and Education
https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2019/06/27/studies-in-comics-special-issue-on-comics-and-education

deadline for submissions: November 1, 2019
full name / name of organization: Studies in Comics
contact email: studiesincomics@googlemail.com


Special Issue 11.1: Comics and Education

Articles are invited for a special issue of Studies in Comics (11.1) on the theme of Comics and Education. Comics have enjoyed a resurgence in the classroom as educators, creators, and scholars have come to recognise the diverse ways in which the medium can be used to support literacy, communication skills, and creativity. Significantly, the use of comics for and as education also promotes cross-medial learning, as readers may use the form as a starting point for further reading, but also to enhance and supplement other pedagogical materials. As Syma and Weiner argue, “it is no longer a question of whether sequential art should be used in educational settings, but rather how to use it and for what purpose” (2013, 1). Comics present an immersive, engaging, and memorable tool for communication because they require the reader to actively participate in the meaning-making process by utilising verbal, visual, spatial, and gestural modes of understanding among others (Bakis 2008). Indeed, comics can help readers of all ages understand complex ideas through these means and allow teachers and learners to explore, stimulate, and enhance educational outcomes.

In recognition of the foregoing, we invite papers that focus on one or more of the following topics, although the list is not exhaustive:

• Case studies of education comics/comics as education
• Teaching and learning with published comics
• Teaching and learning by creating comics
• Comics and literacy
• Public information comics
• Comics as pedagogy
• Comics and embodied learning
• Comics and emotional development
• Comics and learner-based outcomes
• Comics and adult education
• The educational mission of networks like Graphic Medicine and Graphic Justice

Submissions

Please send complete articles for consideration, along with any queries to studiesincomics@googlemail.com with SIC 11.1 in the subject heading. When you send the article the words SIC 11.1 ARTICLE in the subject heading. Articles should be 4000 – 6000 words long and must be received by 1st November 2019 along with a biographical note of up to 150 words. All submissions will be peer-reviewed. Papers must be submitted in English. All articles submitted should be original work and must not be under consideration by other publications. This special issue will be published mid-2020.

We also welcome reviews of new publications and exhibits and short pieces of creative work (1-5 pages in length). Creative work should be relevant to the theme of the special issue. Reviews of publications and conferences and exhibitions: please include the words SIC 11.1 REVIEW PUBLICATION or SIC 11.1 REVIEW CONFERENCE or SIC 11.1 REVIEW EXHIBITION in the subject heading. Creative submissions should include the words SIC 11.1 CREATIVE should be in the subject heading.

Guest Editors: Dr Damon Herd, Professor Divya Jindal-Snape and Megan Sinclair (University of Dundee).


Last updated June 28, 2019

CFP Saving the Day: Accessing Comics in the Twentieth-First Century (A Roundtable) (9/30/2019; NeMLA Boston 3/5-8/2020)

I'm pleased to announce our first call for papers related to our general efforts in comics outreach. Details follow.

Call for Papers for Saving the Day: Accessing Comics in the Twentieth-First Century (A Roundtable)

51st Annual Convention of the Northeast Modern Language Association

Boston Marriott Copley Place, in Boston, Massachusetts, from 5-8 March 2020

Paper abstracts are due by 30 September 2019

Session organized by Michael A. Torregrossa, The Medieval Comics Project, and Carl P. Sell, Indiana University of Pennsylvania

Although the presence of physical comics has declined, the plethora of comics-based movies and television shows available to contemporary audiences has made it almost impossible for an individual not to have acquired a familiarity with the comics medium and some of its most recognizable characters. Even more so than past generations, our students are especially responsive to superheroes and related tropes of comics, but what are the best ways to bring this material into the classroom to illustrate both where the comics are today and where they’ve come from?

In response to these questions, this session will introduce and instruct participants in the use of various online tools (such as comics companies’ websites, comics sellers’ store sites, databases of comics, fan wikias, and repositories) to successfully find and access comics and information about them of value to our teaching and research. This objective is especially vital, as resources like the Grand Comics Database and its various search options, can be invaluable when looking for resources (particularly when paired with repositories of comics, like Comic Book +, comiXology, DC Universe, and Marvel Unlimited). Furthermore, instruction on the various forms of the comiXology, DC Universe, and Marvel Unlimited platforms are of great importance as they stand to revolutionize access to and distribution of comics in the twenty-first century by providing affordable digital editions of books from all eras of the medium’s history. Additionally, fans of the comics have produced important resources essential in any quest to track and understand the larger contexts involved in how comics have developed and their characters evolved; these include various wikis devoted to specific publishers (like the DC Database and the Marvel Database) and sites like The Appendix to the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe. Finally, Comics Studies is a thriving field of scholarship with many print and online resources available. Unfortunately, all of these new resources appear foreign to most educators. We hope that this session will change that and promote a greater awareness of the resources available to successfully integrate comics into our academic lives.

This session is a roundtable, in which 3-10 participants give brief, informal presentations (5-10 minutes) and the session is open to conversation and debate between participants and the audience.

The direct link for this session is https://www.cfplist.com/nemla/Home/S/18042. Please contact the organizers at SavingtheDay2020@gmail.com with any questions or concerns.

Abstract submissions must be made through NeMLA’s official site. Applicants will need to login or create an account at https://www.cfplist.com/nemla/Home/login. Submissions must begin with a paper title of not more than 100 characters (including spaces) and adhering to the following: capitalize titles by MLA formatting rules unless the title is in a language other than English; do not use quotation marks in the session title or abstract title itself but please use only single quotation marks around titles of short stories, poems, and similar short works; italicize the titles of long works mentioned in the paper title; and do not place a period at the end of the title. Submissions should also include an academic biography (usually transferred from your NeMLA profile) and a paper abstract of not more than 300 words; be sure to italicize or use quotation marks around titles according to MLA guidelines.

Please be aware that NeMLA membership is not required to submit abstracts, but it is required to present at the convention. In addition, note that it is permissible to present on (1) a panel (or seminar) and (2) a roundtable or a creative session, but it is not permissible to present on a panel and a seminar (because both are paper-based), on two panels or two roundtables (because both would be the same type). Further information on these and other policies can be accessed at http://www.buffalo.edu/nemla/convention/callforpapers/submit.html.

Chairs will confirm the acceptance of abstracts before 15 October 2019. At that time, applicants must confirm the panel on which they wish to participate. Convention registration/membership for 2019-2020 must be paid by 1 December 2019.

New Blog Name

The blog has a new name, Saving the Day: Accessing Comics in the Twentieth-First Century, effective today. 

It is, I think, much catchier than the old name.

Michael Torregrossa 

IJoCA Fall-Winter 2018

The latest number of the International Journal of Comic Art arrived recently. Full contents list for Volume 20, No. 2 follows from their blog at http://ijoca.blogspot.com/2019/03/international-journal-of-comic-art-20-2.html. (Do also see their site to subscribe.)

A 20-Year Harvest of Comic Art Scholarship: International Journal of Comic Art-1999-2018
John A. Lent
l
A Symposium on Political Cartoons
Edited by John A. Lent
Six in a Row? That Has to Be Some Kind of Record!
Rob Rogers
44
The Editorial Cartoon's Fading Impact - The State of Play in Australia at the Federal Election of 2016 and Beyond
Haydon Manning and Robert Phiddian
57
The New Wave of Investigative Cartooning in South Korea
John A. Lent
90
Drawing Chinese Political Cartoons in Japan: Blessing in Disguise or Trade-off?
Benjamin Wai-ming Ng
110
The Politics of Underground Comix and the Environmental Crisis
Leonard Rifas
128
Mark Knight vs Serena Williams - Crossing the Line: Offensive and Controversial Cartoons in the 21st Century - "The View from Australia" - Part Two
Richard Scully
151
Morgan Chua (1949-2018) and Political Cartooning in Singapore
Lim Cheng Tju
177
Cartooning Poverty: Are Cartoonists Helping Sustainable Development in Egypt?
Sara S. Elmaghraby
181
"Hippies" and Pacifism in Igor Kolgarev's Militariisk Comics
Jose Alaniz
192
Discovering Tom Browne and His Postcards
Milind Ranade
207
Beyond the Printed Page: Dementia, Graphic Medicine, and Digital Comics
Jeffrey SJ Kirchoff
222
Reading Between the Lines: Drawing on the Horrors of Disappearance in "Un asesino anda suelto"
Janis Breckenridge and Maia Watkins
235
A Chat with Izar Lunacek of Slovenia
Mike Rhode
256

A Brief History of Slovenian Comics
Izar Lunacek
261
Currier & Ives's Darktown Series: Recovering White Social Capital through Violent Satire
Melanie Hernandez
268
Superhero Sentimentalism. Analyzing the Social Media Nostalgia for the First Wave of American Comics in Poland
Tomasz Zaglewski
290
Navigating Jimmy Corrigan: Time, Space, and Puzzles, Including Pagination
Jean Braithwaite
312
A Cartoonist Chronicler of Cartoonists' Confabs
Marlene Pohle
342
March Graphic Novel: "American History Lives Again"
William H. Foster III
360
Malice, Metaphysics, and Mengele - Holocaust Motifs and the Renunciation of Evil in EC Horror Comics
Steve Danziger
373
Bishie Man or Woman, It Matters Not: Grotesque Resistance to Heteronormative Love
in Yu Wo's 1/2 Prince
Robyn Johnson
399
Liminality and Meta-fiction in Comics: The Ayotzinapa Case by Augusto Mora
Citlaly Aguilar Campos
443
The V Mask in Translation: From Commercial to Subversive Systems
Joilo Batista Freitas Cardoso and Caio Mattos Moreira Cardoso
464
Intersections of Sex and Violence in Preacher
Ken Junior Lipenga
478
Crime News: Blaming Comic Books for Crimes Committed During the "Golden Age"
Ignacio Fernandez Sarasola
493
Behind the Scenes of the "War in Comics" Exhibit: An Interview with Canada's Andrew Loman and Irene Velentzas
J.T.H. Connor
518
Art Toy as Anatomical Sketch
Paola Moreno Izaguirre
525
Legendary Hollywood Designer Syd Mead's Important Contributions to Landmark Anime
Northrop Davis
536
Charles M. Schulz: Cartoons Without Peanuts
Barry Pearl

542

Reminiscences
John A. Lent
561
The Printed Word
John A. Lent
571
A Review Essay
David Kunzie
574


Book Reviews
Kirsten Mollegaard
Dominick Grace
Mike Rhode
Varsha Singh
Jose Alaniz
590


Exhibition and Media Reviews
Edited by Mike Rhode
Mike Rhode
Dana Jeri Maier
Carli Spinn
Emily Lauer
613