Comics Forum 2014
6th annual conference
Leeds Central Library, UK
13. bis 14. November 2014
Stichtag: 14. Juni 2014
Whether they are depicting the never-ending battles of superheroes, dealing sensitively but shockingly with issues such as domestic violence, or presenting an overview of historical conflicts, the themes of conflict and violence are common in comics. While media effects debates around the depiction of violence and its impacts on readers‘ minds have now largely moved on to other subjects, there is a historical context of concern around violence in comics that persists even up to today, with texts such as Murderdrome being banned from the Apple app store on the basis of objectionable content as recently as 2008.
Comics Forum 2014, the sixth event in the annual conference series, will consider the question of violence in comics and graphic novels, and abstracts are invited for talks to be given at the event.
Subjects for discussion may include, but are not limited to:
- The ethics of drawn violence
- The glorification of and justifications for violence
- The aesthetics of violence as drawn subject
- Media effects debates around violence in comics
- Censorship and the control of violent comics
- Responses to violence in comics
- Violence as problem and/or solution
- Representations of extreme violence
- Pacifism
- The normalisation of violence and cultures of violence
- Depictions of large scale acts of violence, such as war or genocide, in comics and graphic novels (e.g. The Great War, Maus)
- Texts which consider the nature and implications of violence either in and of itself, or as part of a wider context (e.g. Dragon Slippers)
Proposals of 250 words are invited for talks of up to 20 minutes in length, and should be emailed along with a short biography (around 100 words) to comicsforum@hotmail.co.uk. Please put the phrase ‚CF2014 Paper Submission‘ in your subject line. Proposals for panels of either 60 or 75 minutes are also welcome. If you wish to submit a panel proposal, please include the line ‚CF2014 Panel Submission‘ in your subject line and make sure you include an indication of the panel’s length and biographies of all your speakers in your abstract. The deadline for submission is 14/06/2014 and notification of acceptance or rejection will be emailed by or before 01/07/2014.
For further information see: www.comicsforum.org/2014/04/01/comics-forum-2014-call-for-papers/