"Comics in the Curriculum" -- exhibition at Columbia's Butler Library
Hi all,
At the invitation of library management (!), I curated an exhibition called "Comics in the Curriculum" in Butler Library at Columbia University, where I am both the librarian for Ancient and Medieval History as well as for Graphic Novels (and if that seems odd to you, read this).
My goal was to help adjust the thinking of faculty and student about how graphic novels fit into higher education curricula and research. I broke the exhibit (housed in 8 cases) into 7 themes: Heroes and Antiheroes, Race and Ethnicity, Didacticism and Pedagogy, Gender and Sexuality, Perceptions of War, Visual Rhetoric, and Society in Crisis. For each theme I began with one image from "traditional" art, an image which might be a suitable illustration for the topic when creating a list of texts to be read (or "read"). This familiar image is followed by three images of pages from different graphic novels that also illustrate that theme.
It was important to me that comics and graphic novels be seen as just another way to attain a pedagogical goal.
You can read a little more about the process that underlay the exhibition in my column this month for comiXology.com:
http://www.comixology.com/articles/354/Exhibitionist
I hope that those of you nearby will find the time to come by and see it--I would love to hear feedback!
At the invitation of library management (!), I curated an exhibition called "Comics in the Curriculum" in Butler Library at Columbia University, where I am both the librarian for Ancient and Medieval History as well as for Graphic Novels (and if that seems odd to you, read this).
My goal was to help adjust the thinking of faculty and student about how graphic novels fit into higher education curricula and research. I broke the exhibit (housed in 8 cases) into 7 themes: Heroes and Antiheroes, Race and Ethnicity, Didacticism and Pedagogy, Gender and Sexuality, Perceptions of War, Visual Rhetoric, and Society in Crisis. For each theme I began with one image from "traditional" art, an image which might be a suitable illustration for the topic when creating a list of texts to be read (or "read"). This familiar image is followed by three images of pages from different graphic novels that also illustrate that theme.
It was important to me that comics and graphic novels be seen as just another way to attain a pedagogical goal.
You can read a little more about the process that underlay the exhibition in my column this month for comiXology.com:
http://www.comixology.com/articles/354/Exhibitionist
I hope that those of you nearby will find the time to come by and see it--I would love to hear feedback!
Views: 25
Replies to This Discussion
-
Permalink Reply by Peter Gutierrez on
-
This sounds great... how long will the exhibition run? And what hours is it open to the public?
Thanks! -
© 2025 Created by Ryan Goble.
Powered by
