House Democrats applaud after Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi signed the Inflation Reduction Act, August 12, 2022

Do You Trust Your Democratic Representatives?

Scholars of politics and media have been tracking an ongoing collapse of trust in representative democracy's core institutions. What's at stake?
T'Challa from Black Panther

Pantheon of Superheroes

The groundbreaking team at Milestone Comics infused Static, Hardware and their other creations with Afrocentric dynamism, paving the way for T’Challa’s mainstream success.
Xavier University of Louisiana Men's Basketball Team, c. 1939-40

The Visual Medium Has a Message

How does the medium in which an image is rendered, its materiality, shape our perception of the subject matter?
Fred Astaire

Albums: What a Concept!

Long-playing records ushered in the era of the soundtrack, but they also made room for something else—the concept album.
Bill Clinton plays the saxophone on the Arsenio Hall Show, 1992

The Late-Night Circuit: Why Do Politicians Do It?

With a captive audience of millions and a relaxed atmosphere, the late-night talk show offers a good opportunity to make policy discussions more memorable.
A still from "Both Sides Now" by Kandy Fong

The Feminist Art Roots of Fan-Made Videos

Though vidding is now generally a part of online culture, it originated in the grassroots editing efforts of female television fans.
Dr. Rivers Frederick Perfoming Surgery at Flint-Goodridge Hospital

Introducing Our Visual Literacy Column, “Learning to Look”

Developing visual literacy skills unlocks a means of understanding and engaging with the world that cannot be replaced by any text.
A film title lantern slide for Broncho Billy

Whatever Happened To The Male Movie Fan?

In the early days of the film industry, the fanzone was full of men and boys. Then the studios chased them all away.
An image of The Sandman

In the Gutters of Neil Gaiman’s The Sandman

Gaiman’s stories echo with narratives from the Western canon, taken from folktales and communal memory, displaced into something that feels fresh.
Comic books and collectibles are seen during WonderCon 2018 at Anaheim Convention Center on March 23, 2018 in Anaheim, California.

Teaching Comics: A Syllabus

So you want to teach The Sandman? Or William Blake? Or Art Spiegelman’s Maus? A guide to using comics and graphic novels in the classroom.