TRAUMA AND COMICS. AN INTERDISCIPLINARY APPROACH THROUGH PORTUGUESE CASE STUDIES

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Small panels for lower ranges : an interdisciplinary approach to comtemporary Portuguese comics and trauma

Publication . Moura, Pedro David Vieira de; Costa, Fernanda Gil; Baetens, Jan

Small Panels for Lower Ranges aims to integrate a choice of contemporary independent Portuguese comics into the ongoing international dialogue of Comics Studies, an area that has grown exponentially in the last ten to twenty years, but still has many “blind spots” and does not always take into account the production of smaller cultural areas. This dissertation is also part of the particular interdisciplinary field brought forth by Trauma Studies, the culturally-inflected psychoanalytical analysis of narratives (or nonnarratives) that express traumatic experiences. Apart from contextualizing the very state of Trauma Studies, this dissertation attempts a cultural history of modern comics in Portugal in order to better understand how the contemporary production differs from earlier, historical examples, authors after 1974 are able to question more thoroughly the present socio-economic conditions in which they emerge. Somewhat typical of the Portuguese works I address is the focus on “small traumas” and my analysis of the latter will broaden our understanding of traumatogenic conditions (following lessons by Laura S. Brown) and, consequently, emphasise a comprehensive notion of empathy. While woks of art imbued within a political struggle, these comics contribute to “different modes of inhabitation,” in Jill Bennett’s expression. Therefore, it may show how the study of comics may also give back to Trauma Studies.

2017-06-22Tese de doutoramento

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Entidade financiadora

Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia

Número da atribuição

SFRH/BD/77824/2011