Gentrification in Comics and Graphic Novels

Keywords: graphic novels, comics, place, gentrification
Abstract Type: Poster Abstract

Abstract

Over the last decade, comic and graphic novel creators have increasingly examined the constant churn and change of gentrification, and its profoundly dislocating effects. Through an examination of a range of works from Julia Wertz, Ben Katchor, Lucio Zago, G. Willow Wilson, Roz Chast, and Ezra Clayton Daniels, this poster will explore how authors and artists have used the marriage of words and images found in comics to capture, and perhaps to preserve for posterity, some of the ineffable essence of their changing city and its sense of place. Gentrification is inherently disruptive of place attachment, and this poster analyzes the ways that artists and authors have responded to this disruption.