Arts and Humanities Commons^™

How Do Southern, Racial, And Sexual Identities Mix?, Frank Bramlett

English Faculty Publications

This weekend, I have the great fortune to participate in Comics Studies in the US South, a symposium held at the University of South Carolina. My talk explores the juncture of linguistic production, race and ethnicity, and sexuality in characters that are presented as Southern. It isn’t my intention to make a broad survey of comics but instead to examine two in particular, Kyle’s Bed & Breakfast, by Greg Fox, and Stuck Rubber Baby, by Howard Cruse.

The first comic, Kyle’s Bed & Breakfast, is not a comic about the South. It is set in Northport, …

Are Comics Predictive, Or Do They Simply Follow The Society They’Re Produced In?, Frank Bramlett

English Faculty Publications

In early August 2013, Alyssa Rosenberg posted an article about a panel discussion she attended, which was a press tour to promote a new documentary about the history of comics in the U.S. One of the panelists was Gerry Conway, who made the claim that “comics follow society. They don’t lead society.” This was in the context of a discussion about the nature of superhero comics and representations of male and female characters.

Rosenberg’s article explores the disappointment she feels with the restrictive, underdeveloped representation of women in superhero comics. I think we can also ask similar questions about representations …

Does Swamp Thing Have A Penis?, Frank Bramlett

English Faculty Publications

Perhaps the answer to this question depends on who is in charge of the character. While many artists have been involved in Swamp Thing story arcs over the decades, I am most familiar with the Alan Moore arc, with art by Stephen Bissette and John Totleben.

In ‘The Anatomy Lesson,’ there is an autopsy performed on the body of Swamp Thing, who is presumed to be dead and whose body has been frozen for study. The autopsy reveals structures inside the chest cavity that resemble anatomically correct human organs. However, although they look like organs, they don’t function like them. …

Are More Countries On Their Way To Having A Culture Of Comic Book Readers?, Frank Bramlett

English Faculty Publications

his week (starting Monday 10 June 2013), CNN is broadcasting stories every day in a series called Comic Book Heroes. The series will ‘take a look at the writers, artists, films and characters in this global industry.’ The first video in the series is called ‘The Booming World of Comic Books,’ and it is a rather wide-ranging look at the relationship between superhero comic books and the movies that are based on them.

Several men** are interviewed for this piece. Stan Lee describes superhero stories as ‘fairy tales for grown-ups. [Fairy tales] were stories about monsters and witches and …

What Are The Properties Of Editorial Cartoons That Heal?, Frank Bramlett

English Faculty Publications

On 23-24 April 2013, I attended a conference called “Images of Terror, Narratives of Insecurity: Literary, Artistic and Cultural Responses.” The conference was held by Project CILM–City and (In)security in Literature and the Media, and the organizers “aim to examine how literature, art and culture have dealt with notions of insecurity and to what extent they have provided significant challenges and responses to hegemonic discourses.” Visit this website for more information about the project and visit this site for more information about the conference.

The faculty at the University of Lisbon are not alone in their quest to understand how …

Is There A New Kind Of Hero In Comics?, Frank Bramlett

English Faculty Publications

As a linguist, I am professionally devoted to the scientific study of language. But I have a confession: I used to be a literature major. As an undergraduate, I studied in a traditional English department, and I only accidentally found out about linguistics when I took a grammar class. In those literature courses, professors lectured about the different kinds of hero that have been discussed for thousands of years. In Greece, Aristotle wrote about the hero, and in the Middle Ages, the hero was construed differently. In the twentieth century, the notion of the anti-hero became possible, and writers in …

How Do Comics Talk About Love?, Frank Bramlett

English Faculty Publications

In recognition of Valentine’s Day, I decided to write a post about love in comics. But not any kind of love, of course, will do for this post—it should be about love across boundaries and the language that instantiates it.

Scenes from a Multiverse is a web comic by Jon Rosenberg that began appearing on the web in 2010. It explores social situations from an extraordinarily wide-ranging perspective of a multiplicity of worlds. As a satirist, Rosenberg often borrows from current events or internet memes and adapts them for his own purposes, making commentary about what he sees as social …

Which Is Frank’S Favorite Post By Roy?, Frank Bramlett

English Faculty Publications

For my part in the retrospective, I have the pleasure of revisiting Roy’s questions to choose my favorite from. One of my top three is ‘Does the Joker Have Six-Inch Teeth?,’ and another is ‘What the $#@& is Happening to 1986?’ The post about the Joker’s dentition is a great example of Roy’s thinking about the characteristics and conventions, the very nature of comics. On the other hand, the post about 1986 dwells centrally on the relationship that comics have with audiences and, especially, the…uhm…business practices that for good and for ill run alongside.

But for …