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Experiencing Comics: An Introduction to Reading, Discussing, and Creating Comics
Experiencing An Introduction to Reading, Discussing, and Creating Comics shows students how to critically examine the craft and storytelling elements found inside a graphic novel or comic and spotlights groundbreaking work by comics creators and scholars from underrepresented and diverse backgrounds.
This accessible, introductory guide to comics is divided into four chapters. Chapter one discusses how a comic is made and introduces students to the unique form and structure of comics, demonstrating how panels, splash pages, and word balloons are used to tell a story. Chapter two encourages students to apply literary theory and social politics to the world of comics to encourage discussions of comics within a larger cultural context. Chapter three explores the history of comics and introduces students to significant movements and moments in comics history in the United States. The final chapter provides students with comic-making activities so they can practice the craft and storytelling elements discussed throughout the book. Students will gain first-hand insight from comics professionals and practitioners through interviews with creators, artists, writers, anthology editors, scholars, and comics enthusiasts such John Jennings, Gene Luen Yang, Ramzi Fawaz, Lucy Knisley, Kazu Kibuishi, Ronald Wimberly, Sonny Liew, Nilah Magruder, Belle Yang, Andi Santagata, Keith Chow, Yumi Sakugawa, Ryan North, Taneka Stotts, Fred Van Lente, Jeff Yang, MariNaomi, Deborah Elizabeth Whaley, Keith Sicat, Alexander Rothman, Glynnes Pruett, Danica Novgorodoff, Mildred Louis, Jenny Lin, Betsy Gomez, Sophie Goldstein, Ashanti Fortson, Leela Corman, Jeffrey A. Brown, Rina Ayuyang, and more.
Experiencing Comics is an excellent resource for courses in creative writing or comparative literature that focus specifically on graphic novels and comics. It can also be used in gender studies, ethnic studies, and sexuality courses. An Emerging Voices Fellow, Kundiman Fellow, and VONA writer, Rachelle Cruz earned her M.F.A. in creative writing and the performing arts from University of California, Riverside, and her B.A. in liberal arts/liberal studies from Sarah Lawrence College. She is a lecturer at University of California, Riverside, and an adjunct faculty member at Orange Coast College, where she teaches courses in comics, poetry, English, and creative writing. Her latest book, God's Will for Monsters , won the 2016 Hillary Gravendyk Regional Poetry Prize.
This accessible, introductory guide to comics is divided into four chapters. Chapter one discusses how a comic is made and introduces students to the unique form and structure of comics, demonstrating how panels, splash pages, and word balloons are used to tell a story. Chapter two encourages students to apply literary theory and social politics to the world of comics to encourage discussions of comics within a larger cultural context. Chapter three explores the history of comics and introduces students to significant movements and moments in comics history in the United States. The final chapter provides students with comic-making activities so they can practice the craft and storytelling elements discussed throughout the book. Students will gain first-hand insight from comics professionals and practitioners through interviews with creators, artists, writers, anthology editors, scholars, and comics enthusiasts such John Jennings, Gene Luen Yang, Ramzi Fawaz, Lucy Knisley, Kazu Kibuishi, Ronald Wimberly, Sonny Liew, Nilah Magruder, Belle Yang, Andi Santagata, Keith Chow, Yumi Sakugawa, Ryan North, Taneka Stotts, Fred Van Lente, Jeff Yang, MariNaomi, Deborah Elizabeth Whaley, Keith Sicat, Alexander Rothman, Glynnes Pruett, Danica Novgorodoff, Mildred Louis, Jenny Lin, Betsy Gomez, Sophie Goldstein, Ashanti Fortson, Leela Corman, Jeffrey A. Brown, Rina Ayuyang, and more.
Experiencing Comics is an excellent resource for courses in creative writing or comparative literature that focus specifically on graphic novels and comics. It can also be used in gender studies, ethnic studies, and sexuality courses. An Emerging Voices Fellow, Kundiman Fellow, and VONA writer, Rachelle Cruz earned her M.F.A. in creative writing and the performing arts from University of California, Riverside, and her B.A. in liberal arts/liberal studies from Sarah Lawrence College. She is a lecturer at University of California, Riverside, and an adjunct faculty member at Orange Coast College, where she teaches courses in comics, poetry, English, and creative writing. Her latest book, God's Will for Monsters , won the 2016 Hillary Gravendyk Regional Poetry Prize.
188 pages, Paperback
Published September 10, 2018
22 people want to read
About the author
Rachelle Cruz
10 books12 followersRachelle Cruz is from Hayward, California. She is the author of the chapbook, Self-Portrait as Rumor and Blood (Dancing Girl Press,2012). Her work is forthcoming or has appeared in Bone Bouquet, PANK Magazine, Muzzle Magazine, Splinter Generation, KCET's Departures Series, Inlandia: A Literary Journey, among others. She hosts The Blood-Jet Writing Hour on Blog Talk Radio. An Emerging Voices Fellow, a Kundiman Fellow and a VONA writer, she lives and writes in Southern California.
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
February 8, 2019
On first inspection, this seems to be an introductory text to comics studies. In fact, it is subtitled as such. Which is great, because there is a need for such a textbook--something a little more accessible than McCloud's Understanding Comics for first time readers of comics. Unfortunately, this book doesn't deliver on that promise.
There are two reasons why it fails as an introductory text. First, there isn't much original instructional content here. Of the 163 pages, 37 pages are reprints of journal articles or book excerpts (which if you're teaching a university course on comics studies students can probably access for free at the library), and 71 pages are made up of creator interviews and spotlights. That means there are only 55 pages of original instructional material, most of which consists of discussion questions rather than content.
Second, the creator interviews and spotlights don't usually match the content of the unit in which they appear. For example, in the chapter on how to read comics in which the author teaches the difference between a floppy and a graphic novel (trade paperback?) and what gutters and panels are, there is a six page section of authors listing their favorite comics. Knowing authors' favorite comics doesn't really add anything to the chapter on how to read comics. Also, if you have to teach a student what gutters and panels are, it's likely that they won't recognize many of the comics that creators list, so it's not really clear who this book is intended for.
As for the reprinted journal articles and book excerpts, many of those are worth reading if you haven't read them before. Unfortunately, of the four reprinted works, only one of them includes the references, so if you want to examine these sources seriously, you'll have to hunt down the originals anyway.
There are two reasons why it fails as an introductory text. First, there isn't much original instructional content here. Of the 163 pages, 37 pages are reprints of journal articles or book excerpts (which if you're teaching a university course on comics studies students can probably access for free at the library), and 71 pages are made up of creator interviews and spotlights. That means there are only 55 pages of original instructional material, most of which consists of discussion questions rather than content.
Second, the creator interviews and spotlights don't usually match the content of the unit in which they appear. For example, in the chapter on how to read comics in which the author teaches the difference between a floppy and a graphic novel (trade paperback?) and what gutters and panels are, there is a six page section of authors listing their favorite comics. Knowing authors' favorite comics doesn't really add anything to the chapter on how to read comics. Also, if you have to teach a student what gutters and panels are, it's likely that they won't recognize many of the comics that creators list, so it's not really clear who this book is intended for.
As for the reprinted journal articles and book excerpts, many of those are worth reading if you haven't read them before. Unfortunately, of the four reprinted works, only one of them includes the references, so if you want to examine these sources seriously, you'll have to hunt down the originals anyway.
March 29, 2019
Experiencing Comics is a great tool for anyone wanting to know more about an effective way to communicate to new readers about the joys of reading comic books and graphic novels. Growing up reading comics, spending hours at my local Comic book store, this was an experience I had to learn for myself through trial and error. Before the internet, I would learn the joy of consuming graphic novels, how to engage with the artwork, how to best follow along with the author’s narrative without getting lost in the details. What Ms. Cruz’s book does is provide easier access to an elaborate world of graphic art and expression that may seem too daunting for the casual reader without educational context.
She achieves this by respectfully and deligently referencing a solid variety of comics, others textbooks, and relevant sources to strengthen the history of graphic novels as educational tools of literature and visual expression. Too many comic enthusiasts (myself included) rely too heavily on personal experiences in an attempt to convey to new readers “how to” experience comics like they did. This act can seem futile at times since everyone’s experience is different and personal. What this introductory text accomplishes instead is an objective, easy to consume, vehicle to allow the most timid of new comic book readers to delve in the rich history and vast landscape of graphic novels without pretentious “mansplaining”. This text empowers artists, poets, and casual fans to use this medium to create and explore comics from a fresh perspective.
Unfortunately, I think due to the rise of the popularity of the MCU, many armchair experts assume that “fully” experiencing comic-based television shows and movies is only for those who spent hours reading comics as a kid. This superiority bias is too common in the comment section of super hero movie reviews that seem to suck the fun out of what the experience is really all about. By bring it back to the basics, this book refreshes the conversation of what place comics hold in our literary narrative today. This is an essential read for those who want to take an academic approach to the experience of comics!
She achieves this by respectfully and deligently referencing a solid variety of comics, others textbooks, and relevant sources to strengthen the history of graphic novels as educational tools of literature and visual expression. Too many comic enthusiasts (myself included) rely too heavily on personal experiences in an attempt to convey to new readers “how to” experience comics like they did. This act can seem futile at times since everyone’s experience is different and personal. What this introductory text accomplishes instead is an objective, easy to consume, vehicle to allow the most timid of new comic book readers to delve in the rich history and vast landscape of graphic novels without pretentious “mansplaining”. This text empowers artists, poets, and casual fans to use this medium to create and explore comics from a fresh perspective.
Unfortunately, I think due to the rise of the popularity of the MCU, many armchair experts assume that “fully” experiencing comic-based television shows and movies is only for those who spent hours reading comics as a kid. This superiority bias is too common in the comment section of super hero movie reviews that seem to suck the fun out of what the experience is really all about. By bring it back to the basics, this book refreshes the conversation of what place comics hold in our literary narrative today. This is an essential read for those who want to take an academic approach to the experience of comics!
April 18, 2019
This textbook does have the most diverse collection of contributors I have ever seen. There are articles about the LBGTQ community, gender, culture and the like. If you want to find out about non-mainstream comics, this would make a good start, there's an extensive set of links and a good sized bibliography.
As a textbook, this is more about the culture surrounding comics and not the actual artistic aspects. There are very few illustrations and the text is mostly large blocks of fine print, you would need a book like Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art to study the actual language of comics. As many textbooks have, this has a list of questions at the end of every chapter. Some are pretty scary like What is capitalism and liberalism. At least they didn't ask for a definition of existentialism!
An interesting approach to the subject of comics, the only book I've seen on the subject with very few pictures.
As a textbook, this is more about the culture surrounding comics and not the actual artistic aspects. There are very few illustrations and the text is mostly large blocks of fine print, you would need a book like Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art to study the actual language of comics. As many textbooks have, this has a list of questions at the end of every chapter. Some are pretty scary like What is capitalism and liberalism. At least they didn't ask for a definition of existentialism!
An interesting approach to the subject of comics, the only book I've seen on the subject with very few pictures.
March 30, 2019
This is a textbook, but it is so much more than that. I have an indie bookstore, and so many parents come in worrying that their kids aren't "really reading" when they are exploring comics, but Rachelle Cruz' incredible exploration of how comics affect the reader and the multiple levels of interaction that take place when reading comics will calm those fears. Reading comics is a complex, thoughtful experience that will be vastly enhanced after reading Experiencing Comics. The focus on underepresented artists opens worlds. Reading this text opens so many avenues of understanding. Parents, teachers, and comic book afficianados will all gain so much in this book. Whether you love comics or are simply curious, read this book!
July 19, 2020
I found this text very useful and quite enjoyed it!
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews