hawkguy

July 11, 2019 4:01 pm Ah! But there is a comics academia that is doing this kind of work. Great recent texts to start with are: Breaking the Frames by Marc Singer (addresses a lot of the "seminal" work that comics scholars use) Reading Nancy by Paul Karasik and Mark Newgarden Unflattening by Nick Sousanis The Comics Journal most of Hilary Chute's work The Middle Spaces (website) by Osvaldo Oyola If you're into really detailed brainy stuff, Neil Cohn is awesome. Most of my recommendations are more about structure/format, but there is a bunch of great stuff out there about the history of comics from different povs and fields as well. While most comics scholars find their homes in adjacent fields (history, american studies, literature, sociology, linguistics), there are thriving comics studies departments in Michigan, Texas, Florida, and Dundee! Of course, there are some issues with the field, but they are the same issues that most developing fields are facing (Marc Singer talks about a lot of them in his book). The fun thing about academic fields, is that they're not really something that you need to solve. It's an ongoing conversation among scholars, readers, and (yes) fans. As long as the level of thought pushes the conversation forward, all are welcome to add. (end of rant) ps. a bit of a self plug, but for non-academic stuff, PanelxPanel is a great place to look for in depth and thoughtful comics journalism.