Discourse Chronicle

This article takes an interesting approach and is potentially a valid addition to the scholarship on comics. However, at present it is seriously flawed and is not publishable in a refereed journal. The author would need to make substantial corrections to the article, rewriting significant sections of the argument, for it to be published.

[Here is a “revise and resubmit” for an article I submitted about reading comics through a rhetorical lens. I plan on working with this submission further toward publication, but I do not understand how I misunderstood a source that I use regularly in my work. I am hoping things will become clearer after I revisit the article. BK]

category: Comics, Life, Popular Culture, Revisions, Rhetoric and Poetics    

The Post said the cartoon published in the paper Wednesday linking President Obama to a dead chimpanzee was not intended to be racist and charged that some critics of the cartoon were opportunists looking for payback.

[…]

The cartoon showed two police officers with a smoking gun standing over a dead chimp with a caption that reads, “They’ll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill.”

The image is a reference to a chimp was shot dead by police after it attacked a woman in Connecticut on Monday and Obama’s signing of the economic stimulus bill on Tuesday. –Xana O’Neill

category: Comics, Politics, Popular Culture, Rhetoric and Poetics    

[As a second-year PhD student in the Rhetoric and Writing Program at BGSU, my cohort is currently selecting committee chairs for our Prelim exams, which means we are beginning to develop potential dissertation topics. For many years, I imagined pursuing a dissertation arguing that modern comic book crossovers are remediated Greek myths reproduced in a multimodal format and understanding how that changes our literacy practices, but after six years and much deliberation with professors and soul-searching…I am leaving comics behind.

During my coursework as a first-year PhD student, I felt if I wanted to write a dissertation using comics, then I should distance myself from that subject as evidence that I am about more than Rhetoric, Composition, and Comics. Professors confirmed my feeling and I began pursuing papers addressing possibilities using video games and I received a much more positive response, but other signs also contributed to my decision:

• I received encouragement from Cynthia Selfe (a living legend rhetoric and composition professor) at last year’s CCCC conference about a paper I plan on submitting to Computers and Composition.
• Watson and CCCC (two major league conferences for rhetoric and composition scholars) accepted proposals from me about video games and composition.
• I cannot imagine new project possibilities for comics beyond the dissertation.
• I realized that I want my professional identity to be a teacher-scholar and not a scholar-teacher.
• Video games are far less personal than comics to me.

Another major reason I am happy and comfortable with leaving comics behind is my composition students. I always love teaching students about writing well and I constantly try incorporating their literacies into my pedagogy. As a younger self, I struggled with writing well, but I loved doing it and that love predates other interests I hold. Now I am pursuing arguments showing how students improve writing through gaming and reading comics becomes a favorite hobby again. BK]

category: Comics, Gaming, Life, Pedagogy, Popular Culture, Rhetoric and Poetics, Technology    

CT: Gentlemen, how do you think the comic arts will fare against the convergence of different forms of media with the Internet?

MTI: The graphic novel is the next important art form. It’s not necessarily going to replace fiction, drama and poetry. They will exist alongside one another and graphic novels will flourish as it already is. We already have almost classic works that everybody agrees are worthwhile products of the movement. That’s going to persist for a long time.

The thing the graphic novel depends on is the way that it is printed on paper and the layout on the page. If you’ve ever tried to read a textbook on the computer, you know it’s not the same experience at all. I don’t see how you could take a two-page layout of a graphic novel, for example, put it up on a computer screen and respond to it in the same way when it’s in print in front of you. I don’t think that the computer text is going to replace the printed book at all. We’ve got mega bookstores like Barnes & Noble selling books like crazy online. Someone must be buying them and there must be something in that tangible, physical reading experience that makes it different for people. I know it does for me.

Whether the newspaper is going to survive is another question. I’m not so sanguine about that. If anything goes under because of the computer, I think it will be the newspaper. I think comic strips will find another place to exist and the graphic novel will be around for a long time to come.

[M. Thomas Inge (MTI) interviewed as a member of a panel featuring professors discussing comic books and censorship. Inge is a well-respected professor and recognized as the grandfather of comic scholarship. I always enjoy talking with him at National PCA and I look forward to seeing him at MLA in December. Subscription required. BK]

category: Comics, Literacy, Popular Culture, Rhetoric and Poetics    

October 24, 2008 – ARTalks: Comics: A Medium in Transition by Scott McCloud, cartoonist and theorist. 6:30pm, Bowen-Thompson Student Union Theater.

[Sweet! I always wanted to listen to Scott McCloud speak about comics (regardless of his sometimes questionable worth in academia), but I never imagined he would come to BGSU. Maybe I could get him to sign my copies of his books (Understanding Comics, Reinventing Comics, and Making Comics).

On October 25, a gallery exhibit titled Graphic Language: The Art of the “Comic” Book opens at the Dorothy Uber Bryan Gallery through October 5, which I plan on seeing for some ideas toward my dissertation idea. From Elizabeth. BK]

category: Comics, Life, Literacy, Popular Culture, Rhetoric and Poetics    

I am pleased to inform you that your proposal is accepted for presentation at the Comic Book in Popular Culture Conference to be held on the Bowling Green State University Main Campus in Bowling Green, Ohio, October 24-25, 2008. NOTE: The list of papers above is a tentative composition of your panel. The finalized panels with dates and times will be sent later.

[I submitted a paper about analyzing serial longevity as a rhetorical formula involving establishing conventions, innovating them, and returning to conventions. The example used is a story from Superman comics when Superman became Superman Blue. BK]

category: Acceptances, Comics, Life, Literacy, Popular Culture, Rhetoric and Poetics    

Including more than 350 authors and 400 artists, this lush volume contains an essential mix of some of the finest visually-stunning stories of our time. From politically-charged non-fiction sagas to imaginative fantasy tales, this ultimate guide has something to satisfy everyone’s taste.

The first of its kind, this book focuses on each graphic novel separately, honing in on art technique, style and prose, plus an age rating system so parents will know what is suitable for their children. Chapters are divided by genre, complete with individual plot synopses and star-scaled reviews for each book, providing the reader with a concise and balanced understanding of today’s best graphic novels.

[Congratulations! I know Gene and his wife, K.A. Laity, from the Comics and Comic Art area at National PCA. Gene is also chief archivist for comic scholarship and I am convinced all of us comic scholars would be lost without his contributions. BK]

category: Comics, Popular Culture    

[Today I received my copy of the Internaional Journal of Comic Art (Vol. 10, No. 1, Spring 2008) which contains my exhibit review of The Golden Age of American Political Cartooning at the Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center in Fremont, OH! BK]

category: Acceptances, Comics, Life, Popular Culture    

As comic books — or, in more highbrow parlance, graphic novelizations — nudge their way onto the shelves of bookstores and the pages of literary magazines, some well-known writers are trying their hand at the genre. Pop-culture icon Joss Whedon, best-selling novelist Jodi Picoult and rapper Percy Carey are among those feeling the lure of comics. –John Ridley

[From Elizabeth. Comics and graphic novels transition easily from page to screen using storyboards, but a storyboard is different from a comic panel, which Scott McCloud explains in Understanding Comics and Making Comics. I remember strongly disagreeing with associating comics and film in a portfolio paper for my MA degree, but Mark C. Rogers presented a similar argument at last year’s National PCA with “Wile E. Coyote Still Died for Your Sins: Intertextuality and Continuity in Sandman and Animal Man“. BK]

category: Comics, Popular Culture, Rhetoric and Poetics    

[Elizabeth and I returned from presenting in San Francisco on Saturday. Both of us presented well and I am always pleased with how National PCA keeps getting better every year as I celebrate my fifth consecutive year presenting at that conference. Here is a recap about our trip:

Day 0

• Our friends David McClure and Suzan Aiken provided a ride to the airport despite learning about us flying out of Cleveland two days beforehand

• Continental Airlines kindly served a small breakfast with cereal, milk, and fresh fruit along with a snack

Day 1

• Elizabeth and I caught up with my comic scholar colleagues Area Chair Nicole Freim, her husband Jason Tondro, and Amy Nyberg at dinner

• I attended and supported fellow BGSU PhD student Jeff Geers as he panel chaired for the first time

• I caught up with other comic scholar colleagues such as Gene Kannenberg, Jr. and his wife K.A. Laity (author of Jane Quiet)

Day 4

• Elizabeth and I attended each other’s presentations and believe we did well

• My keyring with laminated sheets using “15 min.,” “10 min.,” “5 min.,” and a giant “STOP” sign received good praise as a timekeeping device

• I briefly caught up with Rey Valdez, a PhD student colleague from Texas A&M, who presented on Saturday

• I caught up with John Shelton Lawrence and he asked me to comment on an article he is submitting to a magazine about comics

• I also caught up with Erica Benson, an English professor from UW-Eau Claire, who knows Patrick Day (a professor-mentor of mine from undergraduate work)

• I won “The Korvie” from The Institute for Korvac Studies (a parody panel poking fun at academia and comic scholarship by comic scholars)

One conference down and one more to go. Elizabeth and some of our colleagues are presenting at the 4 C’s conference and facilitating a half-day workshop for college writing programs next week. I am going with them as moral and tech support since videotaping is involved with the workshop. I look forward to it because the 4 C’s is a major conference in the field of Rhetoric and Composition and being there will also give me a chance to catch up with professor-mentors I have not seen in years such as Dennis G. Jerz. I do remember, though, that techies dress in black! BK]

category: Comics, Life, Popular Culture, Rhetoric and Poetics