Academia Assesses Comics

At the end of August, writes Jenni Scott, an unusual event took place - an academic conference at which comics and animation were not just mentioned in brief but put centre-stage, and where comics creators and commentators walked alongside academics from the History of Art, English, and Film and Media faculties of various universities. (Unusual for Britain, that is - in the US, the International Comic Arts Forum, ICAF, has been running for ten years now.)

'The "Aesthetics of Trash": Reassessing Animation and the Comic' is hopefully the start of something new to Britain - a forum for speakers from both academia and the creative side of comics, with a side order of "comics brainiacs" such as Paul Gravett (one of the authors of Great British Comics and a key figure in the British independent comics sector) and Roger Sabin (author of Comics, Comix and Graphic Novels: A History of Comic Art).

The call for papers went out to both these communities, and an extremely interesting and high-quality couple of days of presentation, discussion, and of course socializing resulted.

As people from outside of academia, various things struck us (me, my housemate Dan Hartwell, and his girlfriend and comics creator Deirdre Ruane) as being quite different from any other comics event we'd been to. First of all, the attendee numbers were very small (perhaps 30+) but extremely focused -- every one of those people was amazingly interesting and knowledgeable, giving great papers about stuff few people know about - propaganda cartoon films from as early as 1915, parody in T. S. Eliot and Martin Rowson's The Wasteland, the Bash Street Kids meeting the English Situationists. Not everyone attending was giving a paper - Matt Brooker and partner Dr Lynn Fotheringham (a Classics lecturer at Nottingham University) came along to the first day of the event, but mainly everyone you bumped into was someone who was going to be learnedly discoursing on an interesting and probably abstruse topic later on.

Secondly, there were a couple of specific surprises: giving a paper still means you need to pay to attend, although the fee was reasonable when you consider that food and drink for both days was included. Being in a university lecture theatre means you get decent audio-video equipment and computer support, though it still might take a long time to sort out some requirements. People seem to overrun far more when you schedule them in for twenty-minute slots with plenty of space in each session than if you give them an hour and make them stick to it. (Admittedly in the case of Bryan Talbot he sincerely didn't realize he was supposed to have only a twenty-minute slot!)

Certain aspects were, though, slightly more predictable in advance -- an academic at the podium is likely to spout at least some jargon, though the best of the presentations were conversational and lively in style as well as interesting in subject matter. Academics like a drink after the serious business as much as any comics convention attendee. The extra-curricular silly and serious conversations are some of the best bits of any organized events.

At the end of the second day, there was a plenary session led by co-organizer David Huxley, discussing the possible future directions for debate in comics and animation research. Starting off as a review of the conference overall, with the keynote speakers pulled out at the front of the lecture theatre, the point was made that the project to reclaim comics and animation from cultural disdain is a never-ending one. For instance, while the CAPTION convention over ten years ago had as its theme the very similar 'Comics: Art or Trash?', the communication between campus and creator is not a given and thoughts taken for granted in one area can be seemingly esoteric in another. (Having said that, I was surprised and gratified to learn that more than a couple of attendees to the conference had also attended CAPTIONs previously, including in the very early days, so there was cross-over in that way.)

The discussion moved on to possible next steps. Would attendees welcome another such event? (Unanimous agreement.) Would attendees want to be able to publish articles, either originating in this year's conference or separately, in a dedicated journal that would bring together work from disparate disciplines? (Agreement, though some discussion on finding the appropriate tone and level in such a journal - if it were sufficiently academic to go on a professional academic’s publication record, then might it run the risk of being off-putting to the non-academic comics connoisseur?)

The formal discussion finished, but people were reluctant to disperse, excited as we all were at the conversations started and the contacts made during the two days. In the grand tradition of both comics conventions and academia, it was therefore off to the pub to get in 'one for the road', topping ourselves up metaphorically and literally. When the three of us finally set off, driving through the streets of sunny Manchester, the scenery took a back seat to our fervent discussion of all the talks we'd gone to. It had invigorated our excitement about comics and introduced us to a whole load of new ideas - a very good use of two days away from work.

I was very excited to be asked to present a paper at the Aesthetics of Trash conference in Manchester, writes Matthew Badham. I was less excited when I found out that I'd have to pay for the privilege (but somewhat placated when I found out that this was the norm with academic conferences). I was even less excited when, the night before the conference, my paper disassembled as I rehearsed it to my wife. You see, I'd come up with a high-faluting theory about how the British small press is the real face of the British comics industry. Fast forward a few weeks and I found that I didn't believe my theory and certainly didn't want to expound it to a room full of academics. So I didn't; instead, taking my wife's advice, I spoke for twenty minutes about the small press and why I thought it deserved wider attention (I was on after Paul Gravett and Roger Sabin, so no pressure there then!). Then I settled down to enjoy the rest of the conference and papers that ranged from those that were head-scratchingly obscure (I'm no academic) to those that were witty and insightful.
 
At first I found it a little difficult to keep up in such an ideas-intense forum. Attendees were, in their papers, throwing out all sorts of weird and wonderful insights about both comics and animation at a machine gun-rate that left my head spinning (I noticed several members of the audience furiously taking notes). After a while, though, I got into the groove. It was rather like being at an enormous buffet where if you try to sample every dish you'll only succeed in making yourself sick. Instead I tried to take a couple of ideas that particularly interested me from each paper and store them away for further reflection and discussion in the coffee breaks and at the bar afterwards (where, arguably, the real conference took place).
 
My highlights included Bryan Talbot's fantastic hour-long talk on Alice in Sunderland and his own creative journey from researching and scripting the book, through to the, sometimes, laborious process of producing the artwork to the fallout in terms of a high level of interest in the book; particularly from those with a specific interest in Lewis Carroll, the subject, although by no means the only subject.

There were several papers on superheroes, which I thought would be absolute snooze-fests (mainly because I'm not a fan of the genre). They actually proved to be some of the most interesting. Brian Clarke of Crikey spoke eloquently about the depiction of superheroes in a post-9/11 climate (‘9/11 and Aesthetic Collateral in the American Comic Strip’). His talk referenced, among other things, the issue of Spider-Man that tried to address the events of that day. In my opinion it’s one of the most offensive comics of recent history (it includes Doctor Doom crying, Spider-Man waxing lyrical in an interior monologue about his own impotence in the face of the terrorist attacks, various villains standing by at the ‘scene of the crime’, rendered impotent by the 'true villainy' of the terrorists). Brian’s paper was fascinating and his completed PHD on the subject should be equally fascinating.

Meanwhile, Gemma Corin chose to speak about the depiction of homosexuality in American superhero comics and the fans’ reaction to this depiction, using the New Avengers as an example (‘Secret Identities: Fan discourses on Homosexuality in superhero comics’). She also strayed very entertainingly onto the subject of slash fiction.
 
Of course, as well as various papers about comics (my bias) there were some very interesting papers on animation. I very much enjoyed Dan Hartwell's paper, which discussed animated representations of live-action stars (‘Jackie Chan: relationship between cartoon and live action stardom’). It made some really interesting and insightful points, and all in plain English, which was a bonus for me. Dave Huxley (‘Doing Good by Stealth: ‘Propaganda Animation in the First World War’), one of the conference organisers, gave an interesting talk about propaganda, which would have been worth the conference entry price alone, and gave tantalising glimpses of rare animated footage from the early 20th Century, including examples of Winsor McKay's work. Finally, I must mention Gareth Howell (‘Cartoons, Comics and Convergence Culture’), who made some very interesting points about the way fans have used emerging technologies to reclaim and remake commercial properties (he showed us a fan-created website that depicted Optimus Prime doing yoga).
 
All in all, it was a great two days, not only because of the calibre of the speakers but also because of the broad range of topics and ideas discussed. And I can’t wait for the next one, which I’ll definitely be at, whether as a speaker or attendee.