Drawing in Print Culture: Why Cartoons Matter to the History of Science

A session for HSS 2009

Format: 3 Papers and a commentator

Organized by Roger Turner, University of Pennsylvania

Cartoons represent a little appreciated source for writing the history of science. As a beloved and engaging media form, comic art can illuminate how science has been understood and debated in popular culture. Since cartoons carry long-standing associations with entertainment and political commentary, they cast an unusual light on a discourse generally framed as serious and apolitical. Comics also have a rich history in technical education. Inexpensive and readily understood, yet endowed with complicated conventions and a well-developed graphical vocabulary, cartoons have been used to communicate sophisticated information to audiences of uncertain literacy and scientific background. As a result, both scientists and their critics have adapted genres like comic books, comic strips, caricature, and animation. Roger Turner's paper provides a theoretical framework for our discussion, using examples from his research that shows how the reading practices of print comics guided a new popular science genre in the television weather report. Edward Davis explicates connections between political cartooning and anti-evolution discourse in the decade around the Scopes trial. Michael Rhode and JTH Connor examine how comic books, though associated with entertainment, have addressed cancer. Their examples show ways that comic art effectively combines emotional and technical data. Commentator Constance Clark will discuss the papers in light of her studies of American popular science and the history of images. This session explores the challenges of interpreting comic art, while "drawing" attention to cultural studies of print and reading practices.