Download or read book The Untold History of Black Comic Books written by Bill Foster and published by IDW Publishing. This book was released on 2016-02-02 with total page 252 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A groundbreaking collection in both scope and detail, The Untold History of Black Comic Books traces the changing image of African Americans in comic books from the 1940s right up to the present day. Just in time for the new millennium exploration of diversity in the field, this exciting work presents sample comic books featuring African Americans from the past seven decades! Perfect for fans and comic scholars alike, it includes nearly 200-pages of rarely seen classic and mainstream comics, many in full-color, researched and compiled by two of America's foremost comic book historians.
Download or read book Pulp Empire written by Paul S. Hirsch and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2024-06-05 with total page 346 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Winner of the Popular Culture Association's Ray and Pat Browne Award for Best Book in Popular or American Culture In the 1940s and ’50s, comic books were some of the most popular—and most unfiltered—entertainment in the United States. Publishers sold hundreds of millions of copies a year of violent, racist, and luridly sexual comics to Americans of all ages until a 1954 Senate investigation led to a censorship code that nearly destroyed the industry. But this was far from the first time the US government actively involved itself with comics—it was simply the most dramatic manifestation of a long, strange relationship between high-level policy makers and a medium that even artists and writers often dismissed as a creative sewer. In Pulp Empire, Paul S. Hirsch uncovers the gripping untold story of how the US government both attacked and appropriated comic books to help wage World War II and the Cold War, promote official—and clandestine—foreign policy and deflect global critiques of American racism. As Hirsch details, during World War II—and the concurrent golden age of comic books—government agencies worked directly with comic book publishers to stoke hatred for the Axis powers while simultaneously attempting to dispel racial tensions at home. Later, as the Cold War defense industry ballooned—and as comic book sales reached historic heights—the government again turned to the medium, this time trying to win hearts and minds in the decolonizing world through cartoon propaganda. Hirsch’s groundbreaking research weaves together a wealth of previously classified material, including secret wartime records, official legislative documents, and caches of personal papers. His book explores the uneasy contradiction of how comics were both vital expressions of American freedom and unsettling glimpses into the national id—scourged and repressed on the one hand and deployed as official propaganda on the other. Pulp Empire is a riveting illumination of underexplored chapters in the histories of comic books, foreign policy, and race.
Download or read book Super Black written by Adilifu Nama and published by Univ of TX + ORM. This book was released on 2011-10-01 with total page 201 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A welcome overview of black superheroes and Afrocentric treatments of black-white relations in US superhero comics since the 1960s.” –ImageTexT Journal Winner, American Book Award, Before Columbus Foundation Super Black places the appearance of black superheroes alongside broad and sweeping cultural trends in American politics and pop culture, which reveals how black superheroes are not disposable pop products, but rather a fascinating racial phenomenon through which futuristic expressions and fantastic visions of black racial identity and symbolic political meaning are presented. Adilifu Nama sees the value—and finds new avenues for exploring racial identity—in black superheroes who are often dismissed as sidekicks, imitators of established white heroes, or are accused of having no role outside of blaxploitation film contexts. Nama examines seminal black comic book superheroes such as Black Panther, Black Lightning, Storm, Luke Cage, Blade, the Falcon, Nubia, and others, some of whom also appear on the small and large screens, as well as how the imaginary black superhero has come to life in the image of President Barack Obama. Super Black explores how black superheroes are a powerful source of racial meaning, narrative, and imagination in American society that express a myriad of racial assumptions, political perspectives, and fantastic (re)imaginings of black identity. The book also demonstrates how these figures overtly represent or implicitly signify social discourse and accepted wisdom concerning notions of racial reciprocity, equality, forgiveness, and ultimately, racial justice. “A refreshingly nuanced approach . . . Nama complicates the black superhero by also seeing the ways that they put issues of post-colonialism, race, poverty, and identity struggles front and center.” –Rain Taxi
Download or read book The Secret History of Marvel Comics written by Blake Bell and published by Fantagraphics Books. This book was released on 2013-11-16 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Secret History of Marvel Comics digs back to the 1930s when Marvel Comics wasn't just a comic-book producing company. Marvel Comics owner Martin Goodman had tentacles into a publishing world that might have made that era’s conservative American parents lynch him on his front porch. Marvel was but a small part of Goodman’s publishing empire, which had begun years before he published his first comic book. Goodman mostly published lurid and sensationalistic story books (known as “pulps”) and magazines, featuring sexually-charged detective and romance short fiction, and celebrity gossip scandal sheets. And artists like Jack Kirby, who was producing Captain America for eight-year-olds, were simultaneously dipping their toes in both ponds. The Secret History of Marvel Comics tells this parallel story of 1930s/40s Marvel Comics sharing offices with those Goodman publications not quite fit for children. The book also features a comprehensive display of the artwork produced for Goodman’s other enterprises by Marvel Comics artists such as Jack Kirby and Joe Simon, Alex Schomburg, Bill Everett, Al Jaffee, and Dan DeCarlo, plus the very best pulp artists in the field, including Norman Saunders, John Walter Scott, Hans Wesso, L.F. Bjorklund, and Marvel Comics #1 cover artist Frank R. Paul. Goodman’s magazines also featured cover stories on celebrities such as Jackie Gleason, Elizabeth Taylor, Liberace, and Sophia Loren, as well as contributions from famous literary and social figures such as Isaac Asimov, Theodore Sturgeon, and L. Ron Hubbard.
Download or read book Invisible Men The Trailblazing Black Artists of Comic Books written by Ken Quattro and published by National Geographic Books. This book was released on 2020-12-15 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Hear the riveting stories of Black artists who drew--mostly covertly behind the scenes--superhero, horror, and romance comics in the early years of the industry. The life stories of each man's personal struggles and triumphs are represented as they broke through into a world formerly occupied only by whites. Using primary source material from World War II-era Black newspapers and magazines, this compelling book profiles pioneers like E.C. Stoner, a descendant of one of George Washington's slaves, who became a renowned fine artist of the Harlem Renaissance and the first Black artist to draw comic books. Perhaps more fascinating is Owen Middleton who was sentenced to life in Sing Sing. Middleton's imprisonment became a cause célèbre championed by Will Durant, which led to Middleton's release and subsequent comics career. Then there is Matt Baker, the most revered of the Black artists, whose exquisite art spotlights stunning women and men, and who drew the first groundbreaking Black comic book hero, Vooda! The book is gorgeously illustrated with rare examples of each artist's work, including full stories from mainstream comic books from rare titles like All-Negro Comics and Negro Heroes, plus unpublished artist's photos. Invisible Men features Ken Quattro's impeccable research and lean writing detailing the social and cultural environments that formed these extraordinary, yet invisible, men!
Download or read book Funky Winkerbean written by Tom Batiuk and published by Nantier Beall Minoustchine Publishing. This book was released on 2000 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Collecting the socially aware syndicated comic strip.
Download or read book The Black Panther Party written by David F. Walker and published by Ten Speed Graphic. This book was released on 2021-01-19 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: WINNER OF THE EISNER AWARD • A bold and fascinating graphic novel history of the revolutionary Black Panther Party. Founded in Oakland, California, in 1966, the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense was a radical political organization that stood in defiant contrast to the mainstream civil rights movement. This gripping illustrated history explores the impact and significance of the Panthers, from their social, educational, and healthcare programs that were designed to uplift the Black community to their battle against police brutality through citizen patrols and frequent clashes with the FBI, which targeted the Party from its outset. Using dramatic comic book-style retellings and illustrated profiles of key figures, The Black Panther Party captures the major events, people, and actions of the party, as well as their cultural and political influence and enduring legacy.
Download or read book The Blacker the Ink written by Frances Gateward and published by Rutgers University Press. This book was released on 2015-07-16 with total page 356 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When many think of comic books the first thing that comes to mind are caped crusaders and spandex-wearing super-heroes. Perhaps, inevitably, these images are of white men (and more rarely, women). It was not until the 1970s that African American superheroes such as Luke Cage, Blade, and others emerged. But as this exciting new collection reveals, these superhero comics are only one small component in a wealth of representations of black characters within comic strips, comic books, and graphic novels over the past century. The Blacker the Ink is the first book to explore not only the diverse range of black characters in comics, but also the multitude of ways that black artists, writers, and publishers have made a mark on the industry. Organized thematically into “panels” in tribute to sequential art published in the funny pages of newspapers, the fifteen original essays take us on a journey that reaches from the African American newspaper comics of the 1930s to the Francophone graphic novels of the 2000s. Even as it demonstrates the wide spectrum of images of African Americans in comics and sequential art, the collection also identifies common character types and themes running through everything from the strip The Boondocks to the graphic novel Nat Turner. Though it does not shy away from examining the legacy of racial stereotypes in comics and racial biases in the industry, The Blacker the Ink also offers inspiring stories of trailblazing African American artists and writers. Whether you are a diehard comic book fan or a casual reader of the funny pages, these essays will give you a new appreciation for how black characters and creators have brought a vibrant splash of color to the world of comics.
Download or read book The Other History of the DC Universe written by John Ridley and published by DC Comics. This book was released on 2021-11-16 with total page 262 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The long-awaited miniseries written by Academy Award-winning screenwriter John Ridley (12 Years a Slave, Let It Fall) and beautifully illustrated by Giuseppe Camuncoli and Andrea Cucchi is now available in one volume! The Other History of the DC Universe takes a look at the mythology of the DC Universe as seen through the prism of several generations’ worth of DC Super Heroes who come from historically disenfranchised groups. Extensively researched and masterfully executed, The Other History of the DC Universe promises to be an experience unlike any other. You may think you know the history of the DC Universe...but the truth is far more complex. The Other History of the DC Universe isn't about saving the world-it's about having the strength to simply be who you are. Collects The Other History of the DC Universe #1-5.
Download or read book Stokely written by Peniel E. Joseph and published by Civitas Books. This book was released on 2014-03-04 with total page 426 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the author of The Sword and the Shield, this definitive biography of the Black Power activist Stokely Carmichael offers "an unflinching look at an unflinching man" (Daily Beast). Stokely Carmichael, the charismatic and controversial Black activist, stepped onto the pages of history when he called for "Black Power" during a speech one Mississippi night in 1966. A firebrand who straddled both the American civil rights and Black Power movements, Carmichael would stand for the rest of his life at the center of the storm he had unleashed. In Stokely, preeminent civil rights scholar Peniel E. Joseph presents a groundbreaking biography of Carmichael, using his life as a prism through which to view the transformative African American freedom struggles of the twentieth century. A nuanced and authoritative portrait, Stokely captures the life of the man whose uncompromising vision defined political radicalism and provoked a national reckoning on race and democracy.
Download or read book Marvel Comics written by Sean Howe and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2013-10-01 with total page 569 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The defining, behind-the-scenes chronicle of one of the most extraordinary, beloved, and dominant pop cultural entities in America’s history -- Marvel Comics – and the outsized personalities who made Marvel including Martin Goodman, Stan Lee, and Jack Kirby. “Sean Howe’s history of Marvel makes a compulsively readable, riotous and heartbreaking version of my favorite story, that of how a bunch of weirdoes changed the world…That it’s all true is just frosting on the cake.” —Jonathan Lethem For the first time, Marvel Comics tells the stories of the men who made Marvel: Martin Goodman, the self-made publisher who forayed into comics after a get-rich-quick tip in 1939, Stan Lee, the energetic editor who would shepherd the company through thick and thin for decades and Jack Kirby, the WWII veteran who would co-create Captain America in 1940 and, twenty years later, developed with Lee the bulk of the company’s marquee characters in a three-year frenzy. Incorporating more than one hundred original interviews with those who worked behind the scenes at Marvel over a seventy-year-span, Marvel Comics packs anecdotes and analysis into a gripping narrative of how a small group of people on the cusp of failure created one of the most enduring pop cultural forces in contemporary America.
Download or read book Pulp Empire written by Paul S. Hirsch and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2021-07-12 with total page 346 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Paul Hirsch's revelatory book opens the archives to show the complex relationships between comic books and American foreign relations in the mid-twentieth century. Scourged and repressed on the one hand, yet co-opted and deployed as propaganda on the other, violent, sexist comic books were both vital expressions of American freedom and upsetting depictions of the American id. Hirsch draws on previously classified material and newly available personal records to weave together the perspectives of government officials, comic-book publishers and creators, and people in other countries who found themselves on the receiving end of American culture"--
Download or read book Our Gods Wear Spandex written by Chris Knowles and published by Weiser Books. This book was released on 2007-11-30 with total page 258 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From occult underground to superhero! Was Superman's arch nemesis Lex Luthor based on Aleister Crowley? Can Captain Marvel be linked to the Sun gods on antiquity? In Our Gods Wear Spandex, Christopher Knowles answers these questions and brings to light many other intriguing links between superheroes and the enchanted world of estoerica. Occult students and comic-book fans alike will discover countless fascinating connections, from little known facts such as that DC Comics editor Julius Schwartz started his career as H.P. Lovecraft's agent, to the tantalizingly extensive influence of Madame Blavatsky's Theosophy on the birth of comics, to the mystic roots of Superman. The book also traces the rise of the comic superheroes and how they relate to several cultural trends in the late 19th century, specifically the occult explosion in Western Europe and America. Knowles reveals the four basic superhero archetypes--the Messiah, the Golem, the Amazon, and the Brotherhood--and shows how the occult Bohemian underground of the early 20th century provided the inspiration for the modern comic book hero. With the popularity of occult comics writers like Invisibles creator Grant Morrison and V for Vendetta creator Alan Moore, the vast ComiCon audience is poised for someone to seriously introduce them to the esoteric mysteries. Chris Knowles is doing just that in this epic book. Chapters include: Ancient of Days, Ascended Masters, God and Gangsters, Mad Scientists and Modern Sorcerers, and many more. From the ghettos of Prague to the halls of Valhalla to the Fortress of Solitude and the aisles of BEA and ComiCon, this is the first book to show the inextricable link between superheroes and the enchanted world of esoterica.
Download or read book Still I Rise written by Roland Owen Laird and published by Sterling Publishing Company, Inc.. This book was released on 2009 with total page 246 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Chronicles achievements made since the time of slavery, including contributions to the arts, science, literature, and politics through the election of President Barack Obama.
Download or read book Black Panther written by Ta-Nehisi Coates and published by . This book was released on 2016 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A Nation under our feet" is a story about dramatic upheaval in Wakanda and the Black Panther's struggle to do right by his people as their ruler. The indomitable will of Wakanda--the famed African nation known for its vast wealth, advanced technology, and warrior traditions--has long been reflected in the will of its monarchs, the Black Panthers. But now the current Black Panther, T'Challa, finds that will tested by a superhuman terrorist group called the People that has sparked a violent uprising among the citizens of Wakanda. T'Challa knows the country must change to survive--the question is, will the Black Panther survive the change?--
Download or read book Forgotten African American Firsts written by Hans Ostrom and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2023-03-16 with total page 363 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book introduces students to African-American innovators and their contributions to art, entertainment, sports, politics, religion, business, and popular culture. While the achievements of such individuals as Barack Obama, Toni Morrison, and Thurgood Marshall are well known, many accomplished African Americans have been largely forgotten or deliberately erased from the historical record in America. This volume introduces students to those African Americans whose successes in entertainment, business, sports, politics, and other fields remain poorly understood. Dr. Charles Drew, whose pioneering research on blood transfusions saved thousands of lives during World War II; Mae Jemison, an engineer who in 1992 became the first African American woman to travel in outer space; and Ethel Waters, the first African American to star in her own television show, are among those chronicled in Forgotten African American Firsts. With nearly 150 entries across 17 categories, this book has been carefully curated to showcase the inspiring stories of African Americans whose hard work, courage, and talent have led the course of history in the United States and around the world.
Download or read book The Secret History of AA Comics written by Bob Rozakis and published by Lulu.com. This book was released on 2011 with total page 130 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "In the 1940s, M.C. Gaines sold his All-American Comics line to his partners at DC Comics. But what if, instead, he had bought out DC? And suppose Green Lantern and The Flash had become the surviving heroes of the Golden Age, with new versions of Superman and Batman launching the Silver Age of Comics? Comic book industry veteran Bob Rozakis delivers a fascinating tale of what might have been, complete with art from the Earth-AA archives!"--Amazon.com.
