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    Desegregating Comics
    Debating Blackness in the Golden Age of American Comics

    Qiana Whitted (Edited by), Qiana Whitted (Author), Ian Gordon (Contributions by), Nicholas Sammond (Contributions by), Andrew J. Kunka (Contributions by), Rebecca Wanzo (Contributions by), Chris Gavaler (Contributions by), Monalesia Earle (Contributions by), Blair Davis (Contributions by), Eli Boonin-Vail (Contributions by), Carol L. Tilley (Contributions by), Qiana Whitted (Contributions by), Brian Cremins (Contributions by), Mora Beauchamp-Byrd (Contributions by), Phillip Lamarr Cunningham (Contributions by), Jacque Nodell (Contributions by), Julian C. Chambliss (Contributions by), Mike Lemon (Contributions by)

    9781978825024

    Hardback, published 12 May 2023

    368 pages, 37 bw, 29 color
    23.5 x 15.6 x 3.3 cm, 0.481 kg

    “Only someone living in a cave wouldn't see how thoroughly comics permeate American culture. But even those knowledgeable about graphic arts may not be aware of how comics mirror this nation's often tortured racial history. And even fewer people know about the pioneering Black artists who worked to challenge and change racist stereotypes. What that means is that the groundbreaking essays in Desegregating Comics are essential contributions to an exciting, relatively new field of long-overdue scholarship.”
    - Charles Johnson (National Book Award-winning author of Middle Passage)
    "Desegregating Comics is essential reading for those seeking a more complex and revisionist history of the Black image in comics in the first half of the twentieth century. It includes leading voices in media, literature, gender, and Black studies who unearth the collaborative efforts in the industry to reshape visual and narrative renderings of spectacular blackness and speculations of blackness."
    - Deborah Elizabeth Whaley (author of Black Women in Sequence: Re-inking Comics, Graphic Novels, and Anime)

    Some comics fans view the industry’s Golden Age (1930s-1950s) as a challenging time when it comes to representations of race, an era when the few Black characters appeared as brutal savages, devious witch doctors, or unintelligible minstrels. Yet the true portrait is more complex and reveals that even as caricatures predominated, some Golden Age comics creators offered more progressive and nuanced depictions of Black people. 
     
    Desegregating Comics assembles a team of leading scholars to explore how debates about the representation of Blackness shaped both the production and reception of Golden Age comics. Some essays showcase rare titles like Negro Romance and consider the formal innovations introduced by Black comics creators like Matt Baker and Alvin Hollingsworth, while others examine the treatment of race in the work of such canonical cartoonists as George Herriman and Will Eisner. The collection also investigates how Black fans read and loved comics, but implored publishers to stop including hurtful stereotypes. As this book shows, Golden Age comics artists, writers, editors, distributors, and readers engaged in heated negotiations over how Blackness should be portrayed, and the outcomes of those debates continue to shape popular culture today.

    Introduction: “
    An Apt Cartoon”
     
    QIANA WHITTED

    Part I Iconographies of Race and Racism

    1 Rose O’
    Neill and Visual Tropes of Blackness 
    IAN GORDON
    2 The Passing Fancies of Krazy Kat 
    NICHOLAS SAMMOND
    3 “
    How Else Could I Have Created a Black Boy in That Era?”
    : Racial Caricature and Will Eisner’
    s Legacy 61
    ANDREW J. KUNKA

    Part II Formal Innovation and Aesthetic Range

    4 Desegregating Black Art Genealogies: An Invitation 
    REBECCA WANZO
    5 Misdirections in Matt Baker’
    s Phantom Lady 
    CHRIS GAVALER AND MONALESIA EARLE
    6 The Art of Alvin Hollingsworth 
    BLAIR DAVIS
    7 “
    Hello Public!”
    : Jackie Ormes in the Print Culture of the Pittsburgh Courier 
    ELI BOONIN-VAIL

    Part III Comics Readership and Respectability Politics

    8 “
    Never Any Dirty Ones”
    : Comics Readership among African American Youth in the Mid-Twentieth Century 
    CAROL L. TILLEY
    9 All-Negro Comics and Counterhistories of Race in the Golden Age 
    QIANA WHITTED
    10 “
    This Business of White and Black”
    : Captain Marvel’
    s Steamboat, the Youthbuilders, and Fawcett’
    s Roy Campanella, Baseball Hero 
    BRIAN CREMINS
    11 Al Hollingsworth’
    s Kandy: Race, Colorism, and Romance in African American Newspaper Comics 
    MORA J. BEAUCHAMP-BYRD

    Part IV Disrupting Genre, Character, and Convention

    12 Diabolical Master of Black Magic: Examining Agency through Villainy in “
    The Voodoo Man”
     
    PHILLIP LAMARR CUNNINGHAM
    13 Love in Color: Fawcett’
    s Revolutionary Negro Romance 
    JACQUE NODELL
    14 An Afrofuturist Legacy: Neil Knight and Black Speculative Capital 
    JULIAN C. CHAMBLISS
    15 “
    For They Were There!”
    : Dell Comics’
     Lobo and the Black Cowboy in American Comic Books 
    MIKE LEMON
    Acknowledgments 
    Bibliography 
    Notes on Contributors 
    Index 
     
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