Well it has been a while since I posted here, but that's the life of working on your doctorate...time just gets away from you and your writing and teaching commitments become multiplied in a hurry. I just wanted to pause here at this point in the semester to think some more about why comics, or, why graphic narratives, or why sequential art? What is the appeal and why do I have this need to push it as a valid and real form of creativity, communication, and scholarship that can be used in isolation, but , rather, in my argument, in constant use with other types of media in order to create wider contexts for learners.
I am preparing soon to teach another day on comics in the classroom in a little over a month, and I am in my usual planing stages. This time, however, it just feels like this go around needs to be just as dynamic as the work being discussed. But how? That is where I am currently stuck...what is the pedagogy and theory to augment the intended practices, not only in my execution of the presentation and subsequent discussions, but also in how I can present possibilities for these pre-service teachers to actually see that it is a very real possibility of using this medium in the classroom. These questions are weighing heavily on me also as I recently have started discussions with others about the possibility of my dissertation actually being a graphic narrative. It is elating, but also scary as shit.
Next time, more about this plus actually getting back to writing about comics again, if but for a brief time.
If you want to lend some credibility to the idea of sequential narrative as an art form, you can look back on historical precedent. The Mayans, for example, used sequential imagery in their work. Also any book on the topic by Will Eisner is a gold mine. Good luck. You have lucky students.
ReplyDeleteThanks David! I have used Eisner's "Sequential Art" before, as well as discussed the heavier components of McCloud's "Understanding Comics" (in which I believe he talks a bit about hieroglyphs and symbology) in trying to frame discussions about moving them outside of the box thinking just about the "comic book". My hope is always to get them (and myself) thinking about how sequential narrative occurs more often in a multimodal and interactive world (and really how students participate in such a way everyday already). Also ,can't say enough about my growing fascination with how people are starting to create web comics that embrace the technology and look for how best to use it to create.
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