The Power of Comics: From Eisner to AsteriosMedia Release -- Have you ever wondered why and how comics--still images combined with text balloons and captions--can move us as much as any novel or film? Noted comics scholar Randy Duncan, co-author of The Power of Comics, will discuss just why comics are such a powerful medium. This interactive talk will explore the "inferencing" skills a reader must develop to intuit meaning from a comic book or graphic novel, and will engage the audience in the application of some of those skills. Examples will be drawn primarily from David Mazzucchelli's graphic novel Asterios Polyp and the oeuvre of Will Eisner.

Randy Duncan's 1990 doctoral dissertation, "Panel Analysis: The Rhetoric of Comic Book Form," was one of the first American dissertations devoted to comic books. Duncan is one of the founders and organizers of the Comics Arts Conference, the first American academic conference devoted solely to comics. Duncan is co-author (with Matthew J. Smith) of The Power of Comics: History, Form, and Culture (Continuum 2009) and co-editor (also with Smith) of Critical Approaches to Comics: An Introduction to Theories and Methods (Routledge 2011). He teaches communication and comics at Henderson State University in Arkadelphia, Arkansas

The Power of Comics: From Eisner to Asterios
An evening with Professor Randy Duncan
March 17th, 2011, 7pm
Admission $5 | Free for MoCCA Members