Come Study Comic Books with Me

Five years ago the Art Professor, David Jones and I began a collaborative comic book unit that included my sociology class and his art classes that we never dreamed would evolve into a full class at the community college where we both teach.

We would direct students to create a superhero based who themselves. They were to study the idea of a superhero and then look at who they are and what they believe in and draw a superhero. I found that this was the hardest assignment that I had assigned them but also the most rewarding. Once the projects were complete they would display them at the semester Comic Book Art Show and see how each students art was unique but how each really cared about others and the world around them.

Here is one of the student submissions. Peacekeeper... With all the chaos and hate in the world this student wants to bring the world peace. Who doesn't want that?

One of the Student's Submissions... Peacekeeper

And just like after every Comic Book Art Show, students ask for more lessons on comic books. This year I had good news to give them. Beginning in January, I will be offering a full semester class titled, "The Sociology of Comic Books."

This brought excitement to both the students and myself. As a result, by the beginning of the holiday break the class is two thirds full. So, let's look at what I have planned for this class.

As the name implies, "The Sociology of Comic Books" is a class that looks at the sociological concepts found in comic books.

We will begin with the discussion of how comic books became part of the university academic areas. As I learned in the the "Rise of Superheroes and their Impact on Pop Culture" class that David and I took via the Smithsonian that Professor Michael Uslan was the first professor to get an accredited university course approved on comic books. He discussed that the Dean didn't see the relevance of comic books in the classroom until he had him tell him the story of Moses. He then had him tell him the story of Superman and his dean realized that comic books are rooted in history in particularly mythology, religion, and history. At the moment at Indiana University, the first comic class was approved thus paving the way for me to offer this class at my college.

So the first lesson will be a look at mythology in current superheroes. Moses = Superman, Netpune = Aquaman, Hermes = Flash, etc.

We will then explore the pulps and the look at the darkness and grittiness of crime detectives, in particular, The Shadow. The idea that a playboy like Kent Allard/ Lamont Cranston could be a good guy but yet a bad guy was the perfect mixture later for Bob Kane who modeled Batman after The Shadow. This really allows the students to examine the idea of the law, revenge, vigilantes, and crime.

The Shadow... One of the Most Famous Pulps

From there the class will explore the Golden Age of Comics. We will look at Superman, Wonder Woman, Batman, and Captain America and the use of superheroes as propaganda and patriotism throughout American history.

The second unit will focus on the Silver Age of Comic Books and the introduction of Marvel and all of the social issues of the 1960s and 1970s. This will be the introduction of racism, feminism, drug use, sexuality, and much more.

The third unit will focus on the Bronze Age and the return of comics. The class will focus on The Watchmen, Frank Miller's the Return of the Dark Knight, and will lead into the modern comics and end with The Killing Joke. This is where the class will get into come very strong issues of ethics and what is right and wrong. We will examine where the good line end and the bad line begins with each of the graphic novels above.

This class s very structured around the class that I mentioned above. Michael Uslan was the main teacher with Stan Lee guest lecturing at times. You may find more information about that class here.

The final will be a comic book that they created that will focus on their superhero that they began with the mythology lesson and then show how the social issue that they are fighting has evolved through time. I look forward to working with students on these projects and then seeing the final result.

I look forward to teaching this class and hope that you can join me on this journey. I will be posting more articles as we go along so please follow me here.

If you would like to follow my class' journey beginning in January and ending in May please follow us on Facebook here.