The University of Florida's College of Liberal Arts and Sciences is pleased to announce the 2008
UF Conference on Comics and Graphic Novels: "ImageSexT: Intersections of Sex, Gender, and
Sexuality," which will be held in Gainesville, Florida, on March 21-22, 2008.

The sixth annual conference on comics will focus on issues of representation in the most literal
sense: that of the image on the page (screen, monitor, etc.). We are interested in papers that
move beyond facile reiterations of identity politics to explore the complexities and complexes of
bodies and desires for artists, writers, and readers of comics. Here we are using "comics" in its
broadest sense, to include animation, manga, anime, graphic novels, webcomics, political
cartoons, and even some "fine art." Theoretically grounded work is preferred, but we also have an
interest in archival, historical, and creative papers. The goal of this conference is to encourage
interdisciplinary discussion incorporating diverse approaches to the comics representation of
sex, gender, and sexuality.

Confirmed guests for this year include Phoebe Gloeckner (Diary of a Teenage Girl), Sally
Cruikshank (Quasi at the Quackadero), and Gail Simone (Birds of Prey, Wonder Woman).

Possible topics include but are not limited to:
• Autobiographical and authorial issues of sex and gender in comics, including issues of
veiled autobiography, writing across gender lines, collaboration, and adaptation (Stuck Rubber
Baby, Fun Home, The Authority, Fritz the Cat)
• Archival/historical work on depictions of the body, intercourse and identity including
persistence and/or revision of stereotypes (Tijuana Bibles, Charles Atlas ads, homosexuality in
early animation, Air Pirates Funnies)
• Who's drawing my body? Self- and Other-representations and culture wars (Goth comics,
Superhero(ine) physiques, Dirty Plotte)
• Fans turn Pro (and vice versa): sex and gender issues at the boundary between and in the
transition from fandom to professional comics (letters pages, undergrounds, fanzines, weblogs,
fanfic, slash and doujinshi origins)
• Indeterminacy, including queer readings, secret identities, and the act of passing in and
through comics (How Loathsome, Death Note, Black Hole, The Book of Lost Souls)
• "How ethics spoiled my pleasure": including how female fans read and enter comics, our
implication in â€" and pleasure from â€" objectification, and the comic as part of a cultural circuit of
capital and power (Girl-Wonder.org, Women in Refrigerators, Sequential Tart)
• The comic book fetish, including the materiality of the comic, the pleasure of reading, and
"slabbing"
• The perversity of children's narratives (Strawberry Panic, Hikaru no Go, Lost Girls, Diary of a
Teenage Girl)
• Politics and sex, including political allegory in comics, metaphors of otherness, and sex and
censorship (V for Vendetta, Y the Last Man, Alias, Superfly)
• Representation and its necessary problems, from signifying male- or femaleness to figuring
sex and desire, through drawings of bodies and acts, or depicting intimacy and pleasure (Diary
of A Dominatrix, Clumsy, Playboy comics, (non-) explicit animation)
• International issues, including trade and censorship, translations, and taboos (scanlations,
fansubbing, "official" translations, cross-cultural marketing and audiences)

Abstract submissions should be approximately 250-500 words in length. Presentations will be
15 minutes with 5 minutes of question and answer.

The deadline for abstract submissions is December 15, 2007. Abstracts can be submitted to
lyndsayb@english.ufl.edu or on the conference website: http://conference08.comic-studies.org/

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Received on Fri Dec 07 2007 - 15:13:10 EST