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CIED 5683/ENGL 3903: Graphic Novels for Adolescents

Grad Ed210

Tuesday 6:00 PM – 8:50 PM

Instructor: Dr. Sean Connors

Office: Peabody Hall 304

Mailbox: Peabody Hall216

Office Hours: Tuesdays 12:00 -4:00 and by appointment

E-mail:

Course Website:

Course Description:

In the past decade scholars have expressed an interest in graphic novelsas both cultural artifacts andas pedagogical toolsfor usein literacy education. Like their older sibling, the comic book,graphic novelsinterweavetwo sign systems—word and image—to convey a narrative. As such, the abilityto read and interpret themmight be said to entail differentliteracies—one verbal, the other visual. How do readers interpret graphic novels? What conventions do the authors of graphic novelsmanipulate toinfluence themeanings that readers construct? What challenges does graphic storytelling pose for authors? What makes one graphic novel more powerful than another? These are some of the questions we’ll consideras we work together to explore the affordances and limitations ofgraphicstorytelling. In that regardthe focus of the course is on examininggraphic novels as aesthetic objects, as opposedtostrategies for teaching them.

Course Objectives:

  • Students will describe the historical shifts that have occurredin critical debates aboutcomic books and graphic novels as a form of reading material.
  • Students will explain howthevisual design of comicsfunctions to influence the meanings that readers and authors construct.
  • Students will interrogate the concept of visual literacy with the intention of examining its usefulness.
  • Students will develop new skills for reading and writinggraphicnarratives.
  • Students will develop greater autonomy as readers by generating and answering their own questions about thegraphic novels and theoretical essays they read.
  • Students will read, write, and talk critically about a diverse range of graphic novels.

Essential Questions:

Throughout the semester we will worktogether to answer the following questions:

  • What shifts have occurred incritical debatesabout comic books and graphic novels as a form of reading material?
  • By definition, what are comics, and what (if anything) is distinct about the form?
  • What is the “language” of comics, and how does it function to influence the meanings that readers construct as they transact with graphic novels?
  • What is multimodality, and how does the concept of“Design”providea potential framework forunderstandinghow readers and writers construct meaning in their transactions with graphic novels and other forms of multimodal narratives?
  • In the case of graphic storytelling, what constitutes “excellence,” and how might it be measured?

Required Texts: (available at Campus Bookstore/ 616 N. Garland Avenue)

Abadzis, Nick. (2007). Laika.New York: First Second.

Gaiman, Neil, and P. Craig Russell. (2010). Sandman: The Dream Hunters. New York: Vertigo.

Hadju, David. (2009). The Ten-Cent Plague: The Great Comic-Book Scare and How It Changed

America. New York: Picador.

Kelly, Joe and J. KenNiimura. (2010).I Kill Giants. Berkeley: Image Comics.

Lemire, Jeff. (2009). The Complete Essex County.Atlanta: Top Shelf Productions.

McCloud, Scott. (1994). Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art. New York: HarperPerennial.

Moon, Fabio, and Gabriel Ba. (2011). Daytripper. New York: Vertigo.

Nakazawa, Keiji. (2004).Barefoot Gen: A Cartoon Story of Hiroshima, Vol. 1. San Francisco: Last

Gasp.

Satrapi. Marjane. (2007).The Complete Persepolis. New York: Pantheon.

Small, David. (2009). Stitches: A Memoir. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.

Spiegelman, Art. (2003). The Complete Maus. New York: Pantheon.

Vaughan, Brian K., and NikoHenrichon. (2006). Pride of Baghdad. New York: Vertigo.

Yang, Gene Luen.(2006).American Born Chinese. New York: First Second.

Course Policies:

Warning/Disclaimer:The cartoonists whose work we will study use the comicsform to address a range of sensitive issues, and they do soin an open and graphic way. This course is not for the feint-hearted or closed-minded. If you think you might be offended by graphic representations and discussions of religion, child abuse, sex, violence, prejudice, war, U.S. and Middle East politics, or other sensitive issues not mentioned here this course is not for you.If you have concerns about these issues, please do not hesitate to talk with me.

Late Assignments: Late work will be assessed a penalty of 15% (the equivalent of one full letter grade). Written work submitted two days after the assigned due date will be evaluated upon request, but credit will not be granted.

Submission of Assignments: All work turned in for evaluation should be typewritten and double-spaced, and should employ 1 inch margins on all sides. Please use 12-point font and a legible typeface. Be sure your printer toner allows you to produce clear copies prior to the date of submission. Written work submitted by email will not be accepted.

Academic Honesty: As a core part of its mission, the University of Arkansas provides students with the opportunity to further their educational goals through programs of study and research in an environment that promotes freedom of inquiry and academic responsibility. Accomplishing this mission is only possible when intellectual honesty and individual integrity prevail. Each University of Arkansas student is required to be familiar with and abide by the University’s “Academic Integrity Policy,” which may be found at Students with questions about how these policies apply to a particular course or assignment should immediately contact their instructor.

Accommodations: Students with disabilities requesting reasonable accommodations must first register with the Center for Students with Disabilities. The CSD is located in the Arkansas Union, room 104 and on the web at: The CSD provides documentation to students with disabilities who must them provide this documentation to their course instructors. Students with disabilities should notify their course instructors of their need for reasonable accommodations in a timely manner to ensure that sufficient time to arrange reasonable accommodation implementation and effectiveness. A typical time frame for arranging reasonable accommodations for students who are registered with the CSD is approximately one to two weeks.

Classroom Behavior: Appropriate classroom behavior is expected of the instructor and all students. Inappropriate and disruptive classroom behavior (inappropriate language and gestures, class disruptions, disrespect to other students or instructor, and other behavior determined by the instructor) will not be tolerated and will result in possible removal from the class and/or disciplinary action as per the student handbook.

Inclement Weather: In case of inclement weather, class will be held unless cancelled by the University of Arkansas. If classes have not been cancelled and the student feels it is too dangerous to come to class because of the weather, it is the responsibility of the student to make up missed assignments and be prepared for the next class meeting.

Mobile Devices: I have a family and understand the desire to have a mobile device available in case of emergencies. Please follow my lead by muting or putting your mobile device on vibrate and monitoring it as infrequently as possible.

Incompletes: Incompletes are not given except in the case of a documented medical emergency. If you choose to take an incomplete for any other reason, the default grade will be an “E.”

Course Requirements:

Attendance:Given the importance of our work, your attendance and participation in class discussionsis required. While you are allowed to miss one class, a second absence will lower your grade one letter. A third absence will lower your grade two letters, meaning that you can earn no higher than a “C”. A fourth absence will result in your failing the course. Please note that I do not distinguish between excused and unexcused absences. If you are unable to attend class for any reason, it is your responsibility to e-mail mein advance and explain the situation. If a student is tardy three times, it will be considered an absence.

On-line Discussions: (100 points) Research shows that participating in discussions is integral to learning. As such, I’ll be placing you in small discussion groups and asking you to share your thoughts about the assigned readings each week on ourclass website. In addition to sharing your response to the graphic novels and articles you read, you’reexpected torespond to issues and questions your classmates raise. Your objective in sharing your responseis to take a critical stance toward the assigned readings and initiate and sustain an intelligent dialogue that challenges your peers to think criticallyabout the assigned graphic novels and articles. Feel free to disagree (we are here to push each other’s thinking), but do be respectful of one another. Your final discussion grade will be based on: 1)your responsiveness to the assigned readings; 2) your ability to inspire discussion amongst the other members of your group;3) the frequency of your posts; and 4) the timeliness of your posts. To earn a “B”, you must submit a minimum of two posts per week: one in which you share your response to the assigned readings (300 words), and one in which you respond to an issue or question another member of your group raises (200 words). Out of consideration for the other members of your group, please make sureyou’ve posted your comments no later than 6:00 on the night before class. Note, however, that consistently posting the day before class will lower your grade. This assignment entails a considerable amount of writing, and takes the place of a course paper. It is important that you treat it as such.

Reading Check Quizzes: (60 points)This is a reading intensive course. Recognizing that,during the semesterI'll administer threeunannounced reading check quizzes. The quizzes are not meant to penalize you. Rather, they are intended to ensure that you have completed the assigned readings and are prepared to participate productively in class discussions. Missing quizzes (or performing poorly on them) will have an adverse effect on your grade. As such, it is important that you take time to prepare for each class meeting. The quizzes will draw on both the graphic novels and the assigned articles we read.

Form/Content Analysis Paper: (100 points) It is said that one “reads” books, but “looks” at pictures. Hassett and Schieble, on the other hand, argue that “the texts students encounter today embody cues for reading that extend beyond the letters and words on the page, requiring readers to actively focus on textual elements beyond the decoding of print.” In the case of graphic novels, pictures constitute one such element. This assignment invites you to examine the relationship between the content of a graphic novel and its visual design(an aspect of its form). To complete the assignment, select what you recognize as a key scene in one of the three graphic novels you read prior to the assigned due date for the paper. To begin the paper, contextualize the scene for your audience, and introduce and discuss (briefly) a central theme it functions to develop in the narrative. Next, offer a concise description of the scene, making sure to explain what readers would see. Having done so, apply that information to analyze the role that different elements of the scene’s visual design play in developing the theme you identified. To conclude, discuss the implications of the exercise so far as literacy education is concerned. Some questions to consider: Does one “read” images as Hassett and Schieble suggest? Why, or why not? In what ways might graphic storytelling challenge us to rethink what it means to “read”? Is the language of literary analysis sufficient for reading graphic novels closely, or is it necessary to construct an alternative language of analysis, one that accounts for the visual as well as the verbal? Ifso, what analytic concepts might it include? You are free to select the graphic novel as well as the theme on which you focus. Include a photocopy of the scene on which you focus as an appendix. (AssignmentLength: 4-6 pages for undergraduates, 8-10 pages for graduate students; doubled-spaced, 12-point font)

Show and Tell; or Experimenting with Graphic Storytelling (100 points): This assignment builds on and extends the form/content analysis paper, and consists of two mainparts. In our quest to understand the challenges involved in reading and writing graphic narratives, you’ll be asked to use Comic Life, a software program, to produce an original comic book in which you present a literacy narrative from your past. Prior to doing so, however, you’ll be asked to storyboard your ideas. Additionally, you’ll be asked to compose a reflective paper in which you unpack the vision you wished to impart in your comic book and analyze the rhetorical choices you made as a writerto do so. Finally, you’ll be asked to explain what your experience composing a comic book led you to understand about your interactions withgraphic novels as a reader. That is, what kinds of conventions did you find yourself drawing on to communicate your ideas? You need not be an “artist” to complete this assignment, and you shouldn’t feel any trepidation about your ability to do so. Although you are welcome to incorporateoriginal drawings in your comic book, you are also free to make use of photographs. More information will be provided about the assignment as the due date approaches, and one class meeting will be devoted to introducing Comic Life and working on your projects. Beyond that, you’ll need to find time in your schedule to finish your comic book in the computer lab. The finished comic books will be assembled and published as a class graphic novel.

Final Paper: (100 points)In “Narrative in Comics,” Henry Pratt characterizes comics as “a hybrid art form that employs narrative strategies closely connected to literature, on the one hand, and other pictorial narrative media, on the other.” This hybridity is often charged with underminingthe artistic or literary value of graphic narratives. It also poses a conundrumfor scholars interested in studying comics—namely, how does one measure excellence in graphic storytelling? On the basis of what criteria might such distinctionsbe made? Drawing on thetheoretical articles you read this semester, as well as ourclass discussions,construct a set ofcriteria that scholars or literacy educators might potentially use to evaluate excellence in graphic storytelling.To begin your paper,introduce thecriteria on which you intend to focus, making certain to explain how they function, and why you consider them indicative of excellence. Having done so, apply the criteriato scenes from twographic novels you read with the intention of demonstratingwhy one can be considered astrongerexample of graphic storytelling than the other. Note that the latterhalf of the assignment requiresyou to complete a close reading of each scene. You are free to select the graphic novels and scenes on which you focus. The challenge of this assignment isto synthesize your knowledge of the language of comics and select salient features of graphic storytelling that, when executed properly, result in a cartoonist’susingthe medium of comics to its fullest potential. In that sense your concern is with issues of craft. Support your argument using excerpts from the assigned readings, and adhere to MLA or APA format. Include a photocopy of each scene as an appendix (AssignmentLength: 8-10 pages for undergraduates;15-17pages for graduate students; double-spaced, 12-point font)

Grading:Grades will be assigned based on the instructor’s judgment as to whether the student has satisfied the stated objectives of the course in the following manner:

A =90-100% (414-460 pts.)

B = 80-89% (368-413 pts.)

C = 70-79% (322-367 pts.)

D = 60-69% (276-321 pts.)

F = 0-59% (0-275pts.)

Course Schedule

Date / Topics To Be Covered / Reading Assignments / Assignments Due
1/17 / Course Introduction
- Overview of syllabus
-A (Brief) History of Comic Books and

Graphic Novels

1/24 / Framing the Debate: Reading Comic Books and Graphic Novels
- How have comics historically been regarded as a form of reading material?
- What underling issues have informed debates about comics reading? / Hadju, The Ten-Cent Plague
1/31 / Getting Serious: The Evolution of the Graphic Novel?
- By definition, what are comics?
- What are the origins of the term “graphic novel?” / GN: Nakazawa, Barefoot Gen
Wolk, “Auteurs, the History of Art Comics”
McCloud, Chapter 1
2/7 / The Vocabulary of Comics (Part I)
-What conventions are available to authors of graphic narrative?
What might a metalanguage for engaging in visual analysis look like? / GN: Spiegelman, Maus
McCloud, Chapter 2
Ewert, “Reading Visual Narrative”
2/14 / The Vocabulary of Comics (Part II)
-What conventions are available to authors of graphic narrative?
What might a metalanguage for visual analysis look like? / GN: Gaiman & Russell, Sandman: The Dream Hunters
McCloud, Chapters 5 and 8
HassettSchieble, “Making Space” / Form/Content Analysis Paper
2/21 / The Relationship Between Word and Image in Comics
- How do word and image collaborate to create meaning? / GN: Kelly & Niimora, I Kill Giants
McCloud, Chapters 6
Nikolajeva & Scott, “Introduction”
2/28 / Multimodal Composing Workshop (Class will meet in Grad Ed 351) / Materials for Comic BookandFinishedStoryboard
3/6 / Semiotics andImage as a Mode of Communication
- What is “semiotics”?
- How do “signs” function?
- Are images encoded? / GN: Yang, American Born Chinese
Chandler, “Introduction”
Barthes, “The Rhetoric of Images” / Comic Book and Reflective Paper
3/13 / Multimodality and Multiliteracies
- Why study graphic novels?
- What is multimodality, and why does it warrant attention?
- What is meant by “Design,” and how does it account for multimodal meaning making? / GN: Small, Stitches
New London Group, “A Pedagogy of Multiliteracies”
3/20 / No Class – Spring Break
3/27 / The Role of the Reader in Interpreting Graphic Narrative
- What are diegetic, non-diegetic, and hermeneutic images?
- How might the aforementioned typology account for the different communicative functions images serve? / GN: Abadzis, Laika
McCloud, Chapters 3 and 4
Duncan Smith, “Experiencing the Story”
4/3 / Reading by Design: Experiencing the Unity of Multimodal Narratives
- How do readers construct meaning as they read texts that make use ofseveral different modes?
- What metaphor best captures the processes readers engage in to construct meaning in their transactions with graphic novels? / GN: Vaughn & Henrichon, Pride of Baghdad
Hatfield, “An Art of Tensions”
4/10 / Visual Literacy: Fact or Fiction?
- By definition, what is visual literacy?
- What problems (if any) does the concept of a “visual literacy” pose? / GN: Moon Ba, Daytripper
Gillenwater, “Lost Literacy”
4/17 / Comics Exceptionalism?
- Are comics capable of accomplishing things that elude other mediums?
- How are comics and film similar? In what ways are they different? / GN: Satrapi, Persepolis
Harvey, “Only in the Comics”
4/24 / Are Graphic Novels Art?
- Do graphic novels warrant a place in the literature curriculum?
- What makes one graphic novel more powerful (or aesthetically pleasing) than another? / GN: Lemire, Essex County
Hawkins, “Should We Study”
Groensteen, “Why are Comics”
5/1 / Putting It All Together / McCloud, Chapter 9 / Final Paper

Note: Throughout the semester you are responsible for contributing to your small group’s online discussions. Given the amount of writing this entails,I regard the discussions as the equivalent ofa paper. Your contributions toyour group’s discussions will be assessed at the mid-term, and again at the conclusion of the semester.