By Julian Lawrence, Senior Lecturer Comics and Graphic Novels at Teesside University.

 

Hello, I'm Julian and I've been drawing comics and cartoons for as long as I can remember. As a child, comics helped me to learn French and teachers encouraged me to make comics to develop art and literacy skills. The connections between comics and learning always stuck with me and, after working as a comic book and storyboard artist for 20 years, I shifted my focus to teaching and research. While working on my Master’s in Art Education I became fascinated with semiotics: the study of signs and symbols. Umberto Eco says: “Semiotics is a general theory of all existing languages... all forms of communication - visual, tactile, and so on....” I investigate the signs in comics which help authors tell stories. The signs and symbols we gravitate to also help us to shape our identities, which is another area of research I pursue: the ways making comics helps to shape author identities. In classrooms, comics perform as a participatory culture; it is a medium that supports negotiations of identity within communities of practice. Studying semiotics and authorship steered me towards autobiographical comics and utilising graphic memoir as a research methodology. Julian: It’s so interesting to see that the characters students create are actually representations of themselves! In conclusion, I have offered you a brief glimpse into the ways I apply graphic memoir as a methodology to study comics, identity, and community: by drawing an autobiographical comic to share these themes with you!

 

PANEL 1
Hello, I’m Julian and I’ve been drawing comics and cartoons for as long as I can remember. As a child, comics helped me to learn French and teachers encouraged me to make comics to develop art and literacy skills.

JULIAN: C’est si bon !

PANEL 2
The connections between comics and learning always stuck with me and, after working as a comic book and storyboard artist for 20 years, I shifted my focus to teaching and research.

PANEL 3
While working on my Master’s in Art Education I became fascinated with semiotics: the study of signs and symbols. Umberto Eco says: “Semiotics is a general theory of all existing languages… all forms of communication – visual, tactile, and so on….” I investigate the signs in comics which help authors tell stories.

PANEL 4
The signs and symbols we gravitate to also help us to shape our identities, which is another area of research I pursue: the ways making comics helps to shape author identities.

PANEL 5
In classrooms, comics perform as a participatory culture; it is a medium that supports negotiations of identity within communities of practice. Studying semiotics and authorship steered me towards autobiographical comics and utilising graphic memoir as a research methodology.

Julian: It’s so interesting to see that the characters students create are actually representations of themselves!

PANEL 6
In conclusion, I have offered you a brief glimpse into the ways I apply graphic memoir as a methodology to study comics, identity, and community: by drawing an autobiographical comic to share these themes with you!