Monday, April 23, 2012

(Un)Epic Wonder Women Research References

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I've started dipping into research on comic books, both American (super-heroes) and Indian (Amar Chitra Katha).  While I'm still in very preliminary stages of research, I'm intrigued by how both forms seem to participate in nationalist political discourses (Superman fights for "the American Way," ACK often propagates Hindu ideals).  How we might appropriate these genres in a critical, parodic way?

Here are a few references that I've come across.  Please feel free to add in more references and/or notes on whatever reading you might do!

Queer Comics - No Straight Lines:
http://www.advocate.com/arts-entertainment/comics-and-graphic-novels/2012/07/11/celebrate-history-queer-comics-no-straight

http://no-straight-lines.tumblr.com/

Superman's Origin Story:
http://supermanthrutheages.com/origin/

Dulce Pinzon (immigrant workers as superheroes) (from Kayhan):
http://www.dulcepinzon.com/superheroes.htm

Chitra Ganesh (queer feminist diasporic translations of ACK)http://www.chitraganesh.com/dc9.html

Legion of Extraordinary Dancers (from Sangita/Zhan)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1743034/

CNN's 2 part series on the Indian Comic Book Industry:
Part 1
Part 2

Spiderman, Indian-style (from Zhan):
Superman renounces US citizenship (from Zhan):
Wonder Woman and alternative gender and sexuality roles (from Zhan): http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=7921

Includes theory on super-hero and ACK comic books in India.
"ACK enables a construction of a certain kind of Indian identity: an Aryan, upper-class/caste, Hindu identity, which is projected as a secular 'Indian' one." (118)
 
Sculpting the Middle Class: History, Masculinity and the Amar Chitra Katha, Deepa Sreenivas
"This book is an analysis of the Amar Chitra Katha genre, historicalcomic-books that capture and promote a middle class masculine identity, as culture became the new site for right-wing hegemonic politics in India over the last 4 decades of the 20th century."

The Man Who Was a Woman and Other Queer Tales from Hindu Lore (Haworth Gay & Lesbian Studies).  John Dececco Phd (Author), Devdutt Pattanaik
Has stuff on Urvashi and Arjuna, so perhaps most relevant to my individual investigation or if you're interested in gender/sexuality.  There are some brief ACK mentions though.

3 comments:

  1. Thanks so much for the articles, Zhan! Super interesting and informative. I love the Wonder Women article.

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  2. Have you heard of Dulce Pinzon? A visual artist who took photos of everyday immigrant workers doing their jobs, but dressed in a superhero outfit. It's amazing.
    http://www.dulcepinzon.com/superheroes.htm

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  3. Thanks so much, Kayhan! This is awesome. I had seen Dulce Pinzon's work before, but had forgotten about it. Thank you for the reminder :)

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