Immigrants and Comics

"A vital collection for comics readers and scholars seeking sharp critical perspectives on an art form shaped and energised by migrants. A distinguished line-up of contributors shed light on the capacities of a spatial medium to explore displacement, layer memories and reframe experiences that are invisible within majority cultures."

-- Ann Miller, University of Leicester, UK

"I have been waiting for a book like this. Immigrants and Comics addresses one of the most salient, central issues of our times—immigration—with range, imagination, and necessary historical depth. The wide scope of comics it covers, along with distinct global locations, make this book dynamic and significant. It’s an ambitious—and indubitably important—addition to contemporary comics scholarship."

-- Hillary L. Chute, Northeastern University

"Serrano’s work is a valuable asset to comics studies as well as immigration studies. She has put together a fine collection of essays that analyze comics and immigration issues utilizing multidisciplinary theories while integrating examples from across the globe. Her treatment of comics incorporates a multifaceted approach in examining various aspects of the comics culture, including close readings of specific works, the artist/creator as immigrant and the impact some comics have had on immigration policy."

-- Jeff Williams, Universidad Nacional de Córdoba, Argentina

"This timely collection shows how, from the very beginnings of newspaper comics in the U.S., the history of comics and immigration have been intertwined. From Richard Outcault’s "Yellow Kid" to post-colonial French autobiographies, readers are offered a masterful tour of how the verbal-visual power of the medium has been adapted to represent the immigrant experience from a variety of national perspectives. Engaging written by an international array of well-respected scholars in the field, this collection’s focus on immigration specifically will prove an invaluable addition to comics scholarship."

-- Martha Kuhlman, Bryant University, USA

"This collection makes a convincing case for the significant connection between comics and immigration. Topics range from the depiction of immigrants in American comics that are practically canonical (like Outcault’s "Yellow Kid" and Chris Ware’s Jimmy Corrigan) to the essential ways in which comics have depicted migrant and immigrant experiences across decades, continents, and genres. This book explores comics telling private and public stories, from the past and the present, often showing how the personal is political. The contributors use a range of theoretical frameworks but the collection retains a beautiful coherence through the sustained attention to visual meaning making across the chapters, to reveal the complexities of issues of immigration as captured in comics."

-- Barbara Postema, Massey University, Aotearoa New Zealand