Comics? Seriously? Seriously.

“We gaze continually at the world and it grows dull in our perceptions. Yet seen from another’s vantage point. As if new, it may still take our breath away.”

–Dr. Manhattan, Watchmen

It wasn’t until recently that I began to take comic books seriously. Growing up in the nineties, the medium simply wasn’t as widely accepted as it is today. Comics were for a special kind of kid, the sort who would skip lunch to read in the library or, heaven forbid, the kind that played Dungeons and Dragons on the weekends (activities I now do regularly)! It wasn’t that people weren’t reading comics, it’s that the readership was pretty niche and most of these readers kept their hobby to themselves.

Eventually, when comics started to become cool again with the rise of the Marvel franchise in the late 2010s, I thought I’d give the medium another go. I thumbed through a few copies of Spider Man, Super Man, and, infamous among Mennonite parents, Conan the Barbarian and was scandalized by what I found. Violence! Sensual costumes! And, worst of all, improper syntax and grammar! What was a conservative Mennonite boy to do? I marched right out of that comic book shop, adamant that my dismissal of comics was founded—that comics could only offer the same somatic thrills as late night television and cigarettes. Believe it or not, I didn’t touch another graphic novel until I was finished my Masters in Literature, at which point I was burnt out and dead to anything the academy considered “good art.” Frankly, just needed a smoke. So, I picked up Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ Watchmenand my world was moved for me.

Here was a serious work of art. Here was novel that held gravitas—that wrestled with the human animal and didn’t throw any of its punches. Here was a novel that accomplished things no traditional novel could. Through the blend of images and text, Moore and Gibbons were able to create an imaginary space quite unlike anything in books, short stories or even film. Here was a mode I could really sink my teeth into.

Now more than ever, young people are turning to comics as their chief source of textual entertainment. While in recent years North American graphic novel sales have seen a net increase of roughly 11.7%, as Publisher’s Weekly reports, the juvenile market has jumped by 56.2% in just under a year. With the popularity of various superhero franchises at an all-time high and the increased interest in manga amongst North American teens, it’s time educators—particularly English teachers—started recognizing these mediums themselves.

In this blog, I plan to track my progress as I create my own comic book. Each week I’ll upload a new post summarizing what new tool, tech or insight I discovered along the way. My content will be informed by various scholarly sources regarding pedagogy, technology and/or comics, but will be largely inspired by my experiences as a student teacher and those I collect (with consent) from local high school students. My overarching aims for this project are twofold: firstly, I’d like to see how transferring my reflections on high school education into a comic book format refines (or alters) my understanding of these ideas and, secondly, I’d like to consider how technology informs my research/creative process(es). Ultimately, I hope to learn more about this fascinating medium and how it can be used for the edification of my future students.

Stay tuned for more from “POW! SMACK! WHAM!—Learning literacy through Comics.”