Comic-Con 2013

The most important Batman tales are not in comic books, TV shows, or Hollywood movies. They are within the people for whom the Dark Knight has become a symbol. Brett Culp will premiere segments from his documentary film Legends of the Knight and speak with Travis Langley (Batman and Psychology: A Dark and Stormy Knight), Vasilis Pozios (Broadcast Thought), Patrick O'Connor (Comicspedia), and Alan Kistler (Comic Book Resources) about how the modern myth of Batman inspires real people in areas of creativity, education, and overcoming adversity.

Sheila Malone (University of California, Los Angeles) investigates how Batwoman and Batgirl displace the male hero in order to fight crime and live out narratives that befit a superhero/ine in a contemporary non- hetero world where queer, disabled, and renegade motorcycling are super/powerful. Jaclyn Hymes (California State University Northridge) expands Sedgwick's theories of homosociality by applying them to Maggie and Hopey's fluid sexualities in Jamie Hernandez's "Locas" stories. Using the lens of queer theory, Eric Schlegel explores how Wonder Woman, Superman, and Batman's distinct experiences of identity can help LGBTQ individuals, and then in turn society as a whole, understand our own identities.

Civil rights leaders have long used the communicative power of the combined image and word to discuss voter registration, nonviolent resistance, and human rights. Inspired by the graphic novel trilogy March, co-written by Congressman John Lewis and Andrew Aydin and illustrated by Nate Powell, Joseph R. Givens (Louisiana State University), Andrew Aydin (March: Book One; Georgetown University), Stanford Carpenter (Institute for Comics Studies), Damian Duffy (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign), and John Jennings (University of New York at Buffalo) will discuss the rich history of creative collaboration between civil rights leaders and comic creators.

Scott Daniel Boras (Winona State University) examines the sensory experience of reading comics, what it means to be a collector, and other aspects of materiality that might be lost or left behind when comic books go digital. Neil Cohn (University of California, San Diego) summarize what the latest research from cognitive neuroscience tells us about what happens in your brain when you read comics. Kay K. Clopton (Ohio State University) analyzes how speech, sound, and emotive effects feed into the experience of reading American and Japanese women's comics.