New Trajectories in Comics Studies

This book launch will bring into dialogue the authors and editors of four comics studies publications from 2022. Key Terms in Comics Studies, co-authored and co-edited by Erin La Cour, Simon Grennan, and Rik Spanjers, maps the field of comics studies by bringing together nearly 100 contributors to define over 300 terms and critical concepts currently used in the Anglophone study of comics. In their co-edited volume Art History for Comics and their co-authored Seeing Comics Through Art History, Maggie Gray and Ian Horton counter the dominance of literary and media studies approaches to comics studies by illuminating the medium’s material and theoretical ties to and overlaps with art history. In Graphic Medicine, co-authors and co-editors Erin La Cour and Anna Poletti bring together comics studies and lifewriting scholars with comics artists to engage with the need for different perceptions and representations of illness and disability than those found in conventional medical discourse.

In discussing their colleague’s publications, the authors and editors offer an overview of present-day comics studies and begin to map necessary future inquiries for the advancement of the field. After the critical discussion, there will be a q&a session, followed by a reception.

About the speakers

Maggie Gray is Senior Lecturer in Critical and Historical Studies at Kingston University London. Her research focuses on the performative aspects of comics and cartooning, as a mode of drawing and storytelling, and the politics of performance thereby invoked. Her most recent publications include Art History for Comics (Palgrave 2022) co-authored with Ian Horton, and Seeing Comics Through Art History (Palgrave 2022) co-edited with Ian Horton.

Simon Grennan is a scholar of visual narrative and graphic novelist. He is author of Thinking about Drawing (Bloomsbury 2022), A Theory of Narrative Drawing (Palgrave 2017) and Dispossession (Cape 2015). He is co-author and co-editor of Key Terms in Comics Studies (Palgrave 2022) and co-author of Marie Duval: Maverick Victorian Cartoonist (Manchester University Press 2020), Marie Duval (Myriad 2018) and The Marie Duval Archive (www.marieduval.org) among others. www.simongrennan.com

Ian Horton is Reader in Graphic Communication at London College of Communication. He is a founding member of the Applied Comics Network and the Comics Research Hub (CoRH!!). His book Hard Werken: One for All (Valiz in 2018), co-authored with Bettina Furnee, is the first academic study of this influential avant-garde Dutch graphic design studio. His most recent publications include Art History for Comics (Palgrave 2022) co-authored with Maggie Gray, and Seeing Comics Through Art History (Palgrave 2022) co-edited with Maggie Gray.

Erin La Cour is Assistant Professor of English Literature and Visual Culture at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. Her research focuses on the mediality, intermediality, and affect of comics. She is the co-author and co-editor of Key Terms in Comics Studies (Palgrave Macmillan 2022) with Simon Grennan and Rik Spanjers, and Graphic Medicine (University of Hawai’i Press, 2022) with Anna Poletti. She is also co-founder and co-director of Amsterdam Comics and is a Comenius Fellow of The Netherlands Initiative for Education Research (NRO).

Anna Poletti is Associate Professor of English Language and Culture at Utrecht University. They research contemporary life writing across digital and analogue media. Their most recent publications include Graphic Medicine (University of Hawai’i Press, 2022) co-authored and co-edited with Erin La Cour, and Stories of the Self: Life Writing After the Book (NYU Press, 2020). Twitter: @poletti_anna

Rik Spanjers teaches comics and animation culture at the University of Amsterdam’s Media and Culture program. His recent publications include Key Terms in Comics Studies (Palgrave Macmillan 2022) co-authored and co-edited with Erin La Cour and Simon Grennan, and Een geschiedenis is getekende woorden: Het gebruik van handschrift en compositie in Peter Pontiacs Kraut. Twitter: @rikspanjers