Call for Papers
Comics & Travel
5th July 2019 (All day)
Comics are a static medium capable of rendering the most dynamic and fantastic forms of travel. This conference
seeks papers that engage with comics and travel in a range of ways, drawing on multiple disciplines and comic
genres, as well as the practice of the movement of comics themselves: as artefacts and vessels for ideas and
ideologies. From representations of international movement to comics used to help narrate migrant
experience, from graphic journalism to Lois Lane, from consideration of the practical aspects of depicting
movement to the reception of comics having themselves travelled, whether domestically or internationally,
this conference looks to bring together scholars diverse in both approaches and geography to provide an insight
into the broadly conceived area of comics and travel.
Topics might include:
• Representations of travel (international, interplanetary/stellar, interdimensional, interchronal)
• Industrial histories of distribution and reception
• The evolving nature and practice of depicting movement in comics
• Refugees and migrants in comics
• The national and international distribution of comics and attendant political problems
• Comics and/in translation
• National and global comics traditions and how these travel across borders
Proposals of 250 words, plus a short biography, should be sent to comics@torch.ox.ac.uk (CC
enrique.delreycabero@mod-langs.ox.ac.uk and michael.goodrum@canterbury.ac.uk) by the 8th
March. We also welcome proposals for panels, though all-male panels will not be considered.
