Monday, November 07, 2016

Comics Alternative Podcast: A Roundtable Discussion on Political Comics



I'm back to co-host another episode of The Comics Alternative! This week, Derek Royal and I host a roundtable discussion on political comics and cartoons, just in time for tomorrow's Presidential election.

Our guests are Richard Graham, author of Government Issue: Comics for the People, 1940s-2000s (Abrams ComicArts); Rafael Medoff, co-author (along with Craig Yoe) of Cartoonists against the Holocaust (Clizia Inc.); Kent Worcester, editor of Silent Agitators: Cartoon Art from the Pages of New Politics (New Politics Associates); and Fredrik Strömberg, author of Comic Art Propaganda: A Graphic History (St. Martin’s Griffin).

It's a wide-ranging talk covering history, culture, publishing, academia, and more. All of our guests brought unique insights to our virtual table. We hope you enjoy the discussion!

As always, click the link above to stream the episode, or you can subscribe via iTunes.

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Wednesday, May 04, 2011

The 2nd conference on Comics and Politics- Comics, Censorship and Freedom of Expression / Ben-Gurion university, Beer-Sheva & the Comics' museum, Holon [Israel] 05/16-17

This conference was just announced on the Comics Scholars Discussion List. For information, see the website: http://www.europebgu.org.il/?p=297

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Friday, April 29, 2011

CFP: The Far Right and Visual Politics (coll. vol.), 31.10.11

Call for Chapters
The Far Right and Visual Politics

Editor: Fabian Virchow
(University of Applied Sciences Duesseldorf, Germany)
Deadline for proposals: 31 October 2011
Deadline for article: 15 June 2012

Expose
Although far right movements and political parties in the first half of the 20th century have paid great attention to their visual performance this dimension has not gained much of researchers’ interest for the post WW II period. This volume aims at investigating the use far right protagonists make of images and drawings as a crucial resource for the symbolic definition of political events and as a means to express their world view.

Post WW II far right movements and parties have displayed and disseminated myriads of visual material amongst which Youtube videos are some of the most recent expressions. Visual imagery has for decades been used to illustrate and support written statements (e.g. on leaflets) or has been combined with relatively short verbal messages (e.g. stickers and posters). Photographs and video foo-tage, drawings and cartoons are loaded with political and psychological potential; far right protagonists might refer to a powerful visual register in order to evoke implicit or explicit associations they expect to be supportive for far right politics.

The edited volume aims at presenting various approaches to this complex and multifaceted dimen-sion of far right politics and at combining both the breadth and the depth of research and exhibition in the various disciplines concerning this issue. Following a multi-disciplinary approach, contributions from media studies, sociology, political science, history, ethnography, visual sciences, critical dis-course analysis, and rhetoric are highly welcomed. Submissions should highlight original thought and critical thinking dealing with, for example, but not limited to the following themes:
  • visualizing of far right leaders/leadership
  • visualizing of race relations
  • visualizing of gender roles and gender relations
  • use of stickers and posters and their graphical composition
  • design of banners at demonstrations
  • use and composition of (images in) video-clips
  • creation and outline of comic strip characters
  • creation of graffiti and murals
  • visual registers far right protagonists refer to
  • visual images of the far right in the main stream media
Review Procedures and Authors’ Guidelines
All contributions will be refereed by at least two international reviewers in a double-blind review process. Upon acceptance of your proposal, you should prepare your chapter of 8,000-10,000 words or 60,000-70,000 characters including abstract, tables, listings and references. Guidelines for preparing your paper will be sent to you upon acceptance of your proposal.

Publication
This book will be published by Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften (VS) (www.vs-verlag.de). VS is part of the Springer Science+Business Media Group (www.springer.com) and is one of the leading German-speaking publishers in the field of social sciences. VS is currently expanding its range of English-speaking titles. The book will be published in the book series »Edition Rechtsextremismus« (»Edition Right-Wing Extremism«) edited by Fabian Virchow and Alexander Häusler who are affiliated to the Research Unit on Right-Wing Extremism at the University of Applied Sciences Düsseldorf, Germany.

Inquiries and Submissions
Authors are invited to submit a chapter proposal until October 31, 2011, clearly explaining the mission and concerns of his/her proposed chapter. The chapter proposal (circa 1,200 words or 8,400 characters) should comprise a (preliminary) title, author/s, the basic idea, theoretical assumptions, methodology approach, the empirical material and most relevant references.

Pleasesend your submission together with a short CV as a pdf-file and as a word-file e-mail attachment with [FR-VP proposal] or [FR-VP inquiry] in the subject line. Virus-infected and unreadable files will not be considered.

Proposals are to be sent to

Prof. Dr. Fabian Virchow
fabian.virchow@fh-duesseldorf.de
Head of Research Unit on Right-Wing Extremism at the University of Applied Sciences, Duesseldorf
Düsseldorf/Germany/27-04-2011

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Friday, September 22, 2006

Cartoonists-in-Chief?

Well, not exactly. But the new book Presidential Doodles: Two Centuries of Scribbles, Scratches, Squiggles and Scrawls from the Oval Office presents all kinds of - well, doodles from America's presidents. I learned about this book from a story on National Public Radio's program All Things Considered yesterday; you can listen for yourself here.




In the audio, the authors discuss the oeuvres of several presidents, including Ronald Reagan (top), whom they describe as a "one-time aspiring cartoonist." Some presidents displayed a bit more talent than Reagan, such as Ulysses S. Grant and his horse (upper), while some present work which, as the authors note, seem definite analyst-fodder, such as Lyndon B. Johnson and his bunny, three-headed woman, and, um, ? (lower).

For more information about the book, be sure to visit its official website, which includes the story of the book's genesis, as well as web-extras like a quiz, ecards, on-line presidential resources, and more.




All images from the NPR website, presumably taken from the book.

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