Dear MECCSA Subscribers,
We would like to announce a new publication from the University of Texas Press, which we hope will be of interest.
All New, All Different?
A History of Race and the American Superhero
Allan W. Austin & Patrick L. Hamilton
https://www.combinedacademic.co.uk/9781477318973/all-new-all-different/
Taking a multifaceted approach to attitudes toward race through popular culture and the American superhero,
All New, All Different? explores a topic that until now has only received more discrete examination. Considering Marvel, DC, and lesser-known texts and heroes, this illuminating work charts eighty years of evolution in the portrayal of race in comics
as well as in film and on television.
Beginning with World War II, the authors trace the vexed depictions in early superhero stories, considering both Asian villains
and nonwhite sidekicks. While the emergence of Black Panther, Black Lightning, Luke Cage, Storm, and other heroes in the 1960s and 1970s reflected a cultural revolution, the book reveals how nonwhite superheroes nonetheless remained grounded in outdated assumptions.
Multiculturalism encouraged further diversity, with 1980s superteams, the minority-run company Milestone’s new characters in the 1990s, and the arrival of Ms. Marvel, a Pakistani-American heroine, and a new Latinx Spider-Man in the 2000s. Concluding with a
discussion of contemporary efforts to make both a profit and a positive impact on society,
All New, All Different? enriches our understanding of the complex issues of racial representation in American popular culture.
Allan W. Austin
is a professor of history at Misericordia University. He is the author of two previous books,
Quaker Brotherhood: Interracial Activism and the American Friends Service Committee, 1917–1950 and
From Concentration Camp to Campus: Japanese American Students and World War II. In addition, he served as co-editor of
Asian American History and Culture: An Encyclopedia and Space and Time: Essays on Visions of History in Science Fiction and Fantasy Television.
Patrick L. Hamilton
is an associate professor of English at Misericordia University. He is the author of Of
Space and Mind: Cognitive Mappings of Contemporary Chicano/a Fiction. He has also published on
Los Bros Hernandez, The Walking Dead, and Westworld.
With all best wishes,
Combined Academic Publishers
University of Texas Press
| World Comics and Graphic Nonfiction Series | December 2019 | 392pp | 9781477318973 | PB | £26.99*
*Price subject to change.