CFP 'Disney Across the Globe' (Special Issue of Studies in Comics) (10/1/2025)

Call for Papers: 'Disney Across the Globe'

deadline for submissions:
October 1, 2025

full name / name of organization:
Studies in Comics

contact email:
katja.j.kontturi@jyu.fi

source: https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2025/05/23/call-for-papers-disney-across-the-globe

Call for Papers: Studies in Comics

Special Issue: ‘Disney Across the Globe’

Special Issue Editors:

Edited by Katja Kontturi (University of Jyväskylä)

katja.j.kontturi@jyu.fi

Eva Van de Wiele (University of Ghent and Antwerp)

eva.vandewiele@ugent.be

With 'Disney Across the Globe' we hope to appeal to a global network of comics researchers. Whether Mickey Mouse was first published in Brazil’s O Tico Tico, France’s Le Petit Parisien, or Italy’s Topolino is of less relevance than the fact that Disney characters invaded the global children’s press in the 1930s. This Special Issue endeavours to contextualise this spread as a transnational process of adaptation and appropriation, rather than a unilateral process of colonization. As the 1930s introduced an array of entertainment featuring Disney figures, we also encourage transmedia studies which relate to comics.

STIC invites articles from scholars who:

• Are keen to explore the formats of magazines revolving around Mickey and Donald Duck: weekly, monthly digests, album and picture books, movable books, etc.
• Wish to highlight the transmedia spread of Mickey and Donald Duck and how the Disney comics magazines related to other medial venues.
• Are curious about the commercialization and commodification of children: publicity on in-house products, theme parks, television and radio shows in relation to comics.
• Can study the magazines in as wide a number of countries and languages as possible, especially those lesser-known contexts: Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Brazil, Portugal, Spain, Argentina, etc.
• Locate syndicates, agents and transnational networks of licensing to enrich existing comics and cultural history scholarship.
• Focus on the reception of the magazines and reconstruct the readers of those magazines: looking at correspondence sections, Mickey clubs and communities, editorials and competitions.

Submissions

The editors seek:

• Research articles (4000–8000 words)
• Short-form articles (1000–3000 words)

Articles should have a strong critical focus and draw on close analysis of (comics) texts, communities, histories, and so forth. Articles must be submitted in English (quotes in other languages should be translated for the journal’s readers). Short-form articles may be review-style pieces of new publications and exhibits or ‘state of the field’ commentary. Artist interviews are also welcome.

Images

Any images used must be used to illustrate a point, not simply for decoration. Furthermore, all images of Disney products must fall into one of the two following categories:

• Official images licensed by Disney. We will not accept any screen grabs, and all images pertaining to Disney texts must receive official permission from Disney. You can find the forms needed for this process at this website: https://www.disneystudiolicensing.com/. This process can take quite some time, so plan your submission accordingly.
• Personal images, including (but not limited to) photos taken by the submitting author at Disney’s Parks or other events (does not include any images taken by Disney photographers, which Disney maintains copyright of) and photos taken by the submitting author of fan participation with Disney products. If including faces in pictures, you need to either acquire permission from all people shown in the picture or blur faces.

For full image instructions visit:

https://www.intellectbooks.com/studies-in-comics#call-for-papers

Submission guidelines

Please submit complete articles with corresponding images and alt text form via the ‘submit link’ on the Studies in Comics website:https://www.intellectbooks.com/studies-in-comics. All articles submitted should be original work and must not be under consideration by other publications.

• Articles to be submitted by 1 October 2025
• Peer review process to be completed by 1 February 2026
• Final article deadline (if accepted): 1 July 2026
• Issue publication: April 2027

Address any queries to katja.j.kontturi@jyu.fi and eva.vandewiele@ugent.be with STIC 18-1 ARTICLE in the subject heading.

We appreciate your efforts to circulate this call to any interested colleagues.

Editors

Dr. Katja Kontturi’s Ph.D. (2014) discussed the Donald Duck comics by Don Rosa as postmodern fantasy. She has just published a non-fiction book (2025) based on her Ph.D. dissertation. Currently she is a university teacher of written communication at the Centre for Multilingual Academic Communication (Movi) of the University of Jyväskylä, and is working on an article about the transformation of family depictions in Disney’s Duckverse.

Dr. Eva Van de Wiele teaches Comics and Graphic Novels at Ghent University, and Comics History at LUCA School of Arts Brussels. She is an FWO junior postdoc at the universities of Ghent and Antwerp, working on a research project ‘Reading Mickey’ which compares the production and reception of French and Italian Mickey magazines between the 1930s and the 1960s.


Last updated May 28, 2025