The Comics and Graphic Narratives Forum will be sponsoring three panels at MLA 2024, 124. Mapping Spanish and Iberian Comics and Graphic Narratives, 257. Challenge, Ban, Censor: Curtailing Comics, and 596. The Biopolitics of Comics. We will also be hosting an event featuring comic artist Ben Passmore at Partners and Son, a local underground comics and art gallery, on Friday night! Also, check out all the other comics-related panels at this year’s conference.

124. Mapping Spanish and Iberian Comics and Graphic Narratives

Thursday, 4 January 2023
5:15 PM – 6:30 PM
Marriott – Grand K (Level 5)

Respondent:
Joanne Britland, Framingham State U

Presentations:

  • The “Golden Age” of Spanish Graphic Narrative and Its Contradictions
    Xavier Dapena, Iowa State U
  • Seeing Elephants: Countering the Colonial Gaze in Hispanophone Comics
    Caroline Colquhoun, U of Alaska, Fairbanks
  • The Spanish Odalisque in the Works of Ana Miralles
    Nadiya Aamer, U of Miami
  • Spain beyond Spain: The Tourist Gaze in Contemporary Spanish Graphic Travelogues
    Kathy Korcheck, Central C

257. Challenge, Ban, Censor: Curtailing Comics

Friday, 5 January 2024
12:00 PM – 1:15 PM
Marriott – Franklin 3 (Level 4)

Presider:
Qiana Whitted, U of South Carolina, Columbia

Presentations:

  • “We Don’t Need Nakedness and All the Other Stuff”: Maus, Graphic History, and School Board Excuse
    Chase Gregory, Bucknell U
  • Rhetorics of Ideological Neutrality in CRT-Based Challenges to Jerry Craft’s New Kid
    Patrick Lawrence, U of South Carolina, Lancaster
  • Seduction by the ImageText: Implicit Theories of Comics Censorship
    Aaron Kashtan, U of North Carolina, Charlotte
  • “Nobody Knows Exactly How Many People Were Killed”: Censorship, Death, and Resistance in Puerto Rican Graphic Narratives
    Fernanda Diaz-Basteris, Ohio State U, Columbus

596. The Biopolitics of Comics

Saturday, 6 January 2024
5:15 PM – 6:30 PM
Marriott – 309-310 (Level 3)

Presider:
Katherine Kelp-Stebbins, U of Oregon

Respondent:
William Orchard, Queens C, City U of New York

Presentations:

  • Plastic Bodies and Chronic Conditions: Productivity and Wellness across Kabi’s Diaristic Comics
    Js Wu, U of Pennsylvania
  • Diseased Pariahs, Infected Faggots, and Truvada Whores: HIV Zines and the Making of Biological Citizens
    Nicholas Derda, U of Southern California
  • Eugenic Fantasies, Failed Utopias, and the Biopolitics of Disability in Sci-Fi Comics
    Andrew Lucchesi, Western Washington U
  • Vitality and Visualization: Thinking Comics Value from Laylah Ali and Miné Okubo
    Tony Wei Ling, U of California, Los Angeles