From Betty and Veronica to Slutburger and Art Babe, "Girls to Grrrlz" gives chronological commentary (with attitude) on the authors, artists, trends, and sassy, brassy characters featured in comic books for the last half century. 180 illustrations, 150 in color.

In America, comics and comic books have often been associated with adolescent male fantasy--muscle-bound superheroes and scantily clad women. Nonetheless, comics have also been read and enjoyed by girls. While there have been many strong representations of women throughout their history, the comics of today have evolved and matured, becoming a potent medium in which to explore the female experience, particularly that of girlhood and adolescence. In Girls and Their Comics: Finding a Female Voice in Comic Book Narrative, Jacqueline Danziger-Russell contends that comics have a unique place in the representation of female characters. She discusses the overall history of the comic book, paying special attention to girls' comics, showing how such works relate to a female point of view. While examining the concept of visual literacy, Danziger-Russell asserts that comics are an excellent space in which the marginalized voices of girls may be expressed. This volume also includes a chapter on manga (Japanese comics), which explains the genesis of girls' comics in Japan and their popularity with girls in the United States. Including interviews with librarians, comic creators, and girls who read comics and manga, Girls and Their Comics is an important examination of the growing interest in comic books among young females and will appeal to a wide audience, including literary theorists, teachers, librarians, popular culture and women's studies scholars, and comic book historians.

From Betty and Veronica to Slutburger and Art Babe, "Girls to Grrrlz" gives chronological commentary (with attitude) on the authors, artists, trends, and sassy, brassy characters featured in comic books for the last half century. 180 illustrations, 150 in color.

A reader’s history exploring the forgotten genre of girls’ comics Girls’ comics were a major genre from the 1950s onwards in Britain. The most popular titles sold between 800,000 and a million copies a week. However, this genre was slowly replaced by magazines which now dominate publishing for girls. Remembered Reading is a readers’ history which explores the genre, and memories of those comics, looking at how and why this rich history has been forgotten. The research is based around both analysis of what the titles contained and interviews with women about their childhood comic reading. In addition, it also looks at the other comic books that British girls engaged with, including humour comics and superhero titles. In doing so it looks at intersections of class, girlhood, and genre, and puts comic reading into historical, cultural, and educational context.

This study of the graphic novel and its growth in the library helps librarians utilize and develop this extraordinarily popular format in their library collections. What does the surge of popularity in graphic novels mean for libraries? Graphic Novels Beyond the Basics: Insights and Issues for Libraries goes deeper into this subject than any other volume previously published, bringing together a distinguished panel of experts to examine questions librarians may encounter as they work to enhance their graphic novel holdings. Graphic Novels Beyond the Basics begins by introducing librarians to the world of the graphic novel: popular and critically acclaimed fiction and nonfiction titles; a wide range of genres including Japanese manga and other international favorites; recurring story and character archetypes; and titles created for specific cultural audiences and female readers. The book then offers a series of chapters on key issues librarians will face with graphic novels on the shelves, including processing and retention questions, preservation and retention, collecting related media such as Japanese anime films and video games, potential grounds for patron or parental complaints, the future of graphic novels, and more.

This book proposes a new history of the graphic novel by examining how it recirculates older comics in the present.

Superheroes have been the major genre to emerge from comics and graphic novels, saturating popular culture with images of muscular men and sexy women. A major aspect of this genre is identity in the roles played by individuals, the development of identities through extended stories and in the ways the characters inspire audiences. This collection analyses stories from popular comics franchises such as Batman, Captain America, Ms Marvel and X-Men, alongside less well known comics such as Kabuki and Flex Mentallo. It explores what superhero narratives can reveal about our attitudes towards femininity, race, maternity, masculinity and queer culture. Using this approach, the volume asks questions such as why there are no black supervillains in mainstream comics, how second wave feminism and feminist film theory may help us to understand female comic book characters, the ways in which Flex Mentallo transcends the boundaries of straightness and gayness and how both fans and industry appropriate the sexual identity of superheroes. The book was originally published in a special issue of the Journal of Graphic Novels and Comics.

This book explores the diversity of meanings ascribed to the turn-of-the-century New Woman in the context of cultural debates conducted within and across a wide range of national frameworks. Individual chapters by international scholars scrutinize the flow of ideas, images, and textual parameters of New Woman discourses in the UK, North America, Europe, and Japan, elucidating the national and ethnic hybridity of the 'modern woman' by locating this figure within both international consumer culture and feminist writing. The volume will be essential reading for advanced students and researchers of American Studies, Women's Studies, and Women's History.

Nominee for the 2021 Eisner Awards Best Academic/Scholarly Work In the twenty-first century, the field of comics studies has exploded. Scholarship on graphic novels, comic books, comic strips, webcomics, manga, and all forms of comic art has grown at a dizzying pace, with new publications, institutions, and courses springing up everywhere. The field crosses disciplinary and cultural borders and brings together myriad traditions. Comics Studies: A Guidebook offers a rich but concise introduction to this multifaceted field, authored by leading experts in multiple disciplines. It opens diverse entryways to comics studies, including history, form, audiences, genre, and cultural, industrial, and economic contexts. An invaluable one-stop resource for veteran and new comics scholars alike, this guidebook represents the state of the art in contemporary comics scholarship.

And 1970s, and the dark and violent creatures who embody the pre- and post-millennial crises of faith. Lavishly illustrated, the articles come to startling conclusions about what we have really been reading under the covers with flashlights for generations. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com).