Content warning: this post is illustrated with offensive images from an unusual Golden-Age comic book that may disturb. When I turned back to writing about comics, I couldn’t stop thinking of magic, religion, and race, three interconnected topics I can’t seem to get enough of. It’s all so very fraught, but it is very interesting,Continue reading “Best-Forgotten: Race, Religion, and the Super Magician comics”
Tag Archives: comics
Black Gods of the Cosmopolis!
This is the third in a series of posts on Africana religions and the comics. Some remarkable images made their way around the digital space this week. Aficionados of black religion will immediately recognize these extraordinary renderings of the popular divinities in Brazil that are known as orixas. Worshipped throughout the Americas but especially beloved in Bahia, theContinue reading “Black Gods of the Cosmopolis!”
Voodoo Brothers: Africana Religions and the Comics, pt. 2
As some of you know, my current project is a book-length study of Africana religions and comics, where I consider how graphic formats are utilized for representing the spiritual traditions of black people. I keep getting sidetracked, though, because the sources are so diverse, and there are a million different stories that need to be told. SoContinue reading “Voodoo Brothers: Africana Religions and the Comics, pt. 2”
She-roes and She-gods? Africana Religions and the Comics, pt. one
Are you a comics fan? My latest project deals with religion in comic books and graphic novels from the Golden Age to the present, where I look for characters who possess what might be seen as god-like powers, supernatural abilities, and fantastic technologies. Perhaps we might think of them as modern-day deities. Being obsessed with religion I wonder if there isContinue reading “She-roes and She-gods? Africana Religions and the Comics, pt. one”
On the Trail of Digital Comics Collections
Now that the examination of comics and graphic novels is becoming established as a field of study by the American Academy of Religion, it behooves researchers to be able to track down the best library archives and collections for doing this work. I am glad that the definition of viable texts for academic analysis andContinue reading “On the Trail of Digital Comics Collections”
Africana Religion and Comics, Towards a Useful Semiotics
All respect for one of the first black-owned comics to feature African and African-descended characters and heroes in a single issue. Please support research on the comics! See, for example, this extraordinary presentation online at Google Arts and Culture. …we especially want to know about representation, race, gender, and the African guy with an arrow in hisContinue reading “Africana Religion and Comics, Towards a Useful Semiotics”