Graphic Novel Interest Group To Host Kick-Off Event On Feb. 23
Alejandro Izcaray learned to read using Batman comics because he believed they were the most stimulating art form for his imagination.
So, naturally, he was elated to hear that the Graphic Novel Interest Group, a collegewide organization that plans to host book discussions, guest lecturers and workshops, was getting started at Miami Dade College.
“I was immediately intrigued,” said Izcaray, a mechanical engineering student at Kendall Campus. “I thought that it was extremely cool that there is a community of people that also enjoy this.”
The group’s first event will served as an opportunity for students, faculty, and staff to express their interest in graphic novels through readings and discussions. They will host a kick-off event via Zoom on Feb. 23 at noon.
“I just think there is a real need for it,” said Jennifer Saxton, the faculty librarian at Kendall Campus and chairperson of the Graphic Novels Interest Group. “Graphic novels are becoming so popular.”
Interest in comics and graphic novels has skyrocketed in recent years. Comichron, a research site collecting data on the genre, reports that sales for comics and graphic novels reached approximately $1.28 billion in the United States and Canada in 2020, a 6% increase from the previous year.
At the Feb. 23 meeting, the group will announce which graphic novel GNIG will read and discuss throughout the semester. Future meetups will be announced at a later date. Seven graphic novels are up for consideration.
Voting is open online to all MDC students. The options are: The Best We Could Do by Thi Bui, Blue Is The Warmest Color by Julie Maroh, Kindred by Octavia E. Butler, adapted by Damian Duffy and John Jennings, Monsters by Barry Windsor-Smith, A Silent Voice 1 by Oima Yoshitoki, They Called Us Enemy by George Takei, Justin Eisinger, Steven Scott and Harmony Becker, and Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons.
A brief description of each novel is listed on their website.
Students who vote for a graphic novel will be automatically entered into a contest to win a free physical copy of the book that wins the nomination. More than 50 students have participated in the voting thus far.
Dennis Edelen, an instructional assistant at Kendall Campus Learning Resources, helped create the interest group because of his lifelong passion for comics.
Edelen learned to read in the late 1960s using classic comics such as Spider-Man and Batman. Since then, he has collected and read comics and graphic novels as a hobby, with his collection totaling around 3,500.
“We want to inspire, we want to excite, we want to introduce and we want to help foster, maybe locally, the next generation of creators within the format,” Edelen said.
For more information about the GNIG, contact Jennifer Saxton at jsaxton@mdc.edu.
