ENGL 281 - Comics and Graphic Novels

Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)

This course examines comics and their longer-form descendent the graphic novel as both popular literature and distinct developments in the long history of visual storytelling. This history of the comic form has persistently been defined by a preoccupation with the fantastical (superheroes to supernatural horror) and the realistic (autobiography to historical witness) that opens an array of topics to explore: the politics of representation and identity, mythology and the epic hero, desire and the unconscious, material culture and book history, the relationship between text and image, media studies and adaptation. Through such focused study, we emerge from the course with a grounding in methods of comics analysis and a complex understanding of the development of the graphic novel and its relationship to the literary. Readings may include work by Alison Bechdel, Will Eisner, Charles Burns, Junji Ito, Julie Doucet, Marjane Satrapi, Jillian Tamaki, Yvan Alegbe, Lynda Barry, Art Spiegelman, Alan Moore, Joe Sacco, Jaime Hernandez, among others. Seth Cosimini.

Two 75-minute periods.

Course Format: CLS