Reading comics for the field of International Relations: Theory, method and the Bosnian War

EJ R
I
https://doi.org/10.1177/1354066116656763
European Journal of International Relations, Vol. 23(3) 581 –608
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DOI: 10.1177/1354066116656763
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Reading comics for the field
of International Relations
Theory, method and the
Bosnian War
Lene Hansen
University of Copenhagen, Denmark
Abstract
This article draws attention to a medium that has escaped the attention of International Relations scholars comics. Comics are combinations of text and drawings and they come in a variety of formats as newspaper strips, as stories printed in magazines and as long narratives presented in freestanding books. Comics have been central to how generations of children have encountered foreign places and comics artists have successfully captured public attention, with comics offering explicit engagements with foreign policy events. Theoretically, comics provide a unique combination of text and images through which central questions on the research agenda of International Relations scholars working on visuality, practices and intertextuality can be pursued. Drawing on comics scholarship, this article presents a theoretical framework aimed specifically at analysing comics as international relations. Methodologically, it provides criteria for the selection of comics understudy and a case study of three comics engaging the Bosnian War.
Keywords
Bosnian War, comics, images, methodology, popular culture, poststructuralism
Introduction
The goal of this article is to bring comics onto the research agenda of International Relations (IR. Comics area distinctive medium with a particular cultural, sociological and economic history and away of using text and images that cannot be subsumed under