dale jacobs more than words: comics as a means of teaching

The History of Attitudes toward Comics and Literacy

Prior to their current renaissance, comics were oftenviewed, at best, as popular entertainment and, atworst, as a dangerous influence on youth. Such atti-tudes were certainly prevalent in the early 1950swhen comics were at their most popular, with crit-ics such as Fredric Wertham voicing the moststrenuous arguments against comics in his 1954book Seduction of the Innocent (for an extended discus-sion of this debate, see Dorrell, Curtis, and Ram-pal). Wertham baldly asserts that “[c]omic booksare death on reading” (121). He goes on, “Readingtroubles in children are on the increase. An impor-tant cause of this increase is the comic book. A verylarge proportion of children who cannot read wellhabitually read comic books. They are not reallyreaders, but gaze mostly at the pictures, picking upa word here and there. Among the worst readers is avery high percentage of comic-book addicts whospend very much time ‘reading’ comic books. Theyare book-worms without books” (122). Accordingto this thinking, children who read comic books arenot really reading; they are simply looking at thepictures as a way to avoid engaging in the complexprocesses of learning to read. The problem, accord-ing to Wertham, is that in reading comics childrenfocus far too much on the image to make meaningand avoid engaging with the written word, a semi-otic system that Wertham clearly sees as both morecomplex and more important. Though he sees the

ver the last several years, comicshave been an ever more visible andwell-regarded part of mainstreamculture. Comics are now reviewed

in major newspapers and featured on the shelves ofindependent and chain bookstores. Major publish-ing houses such as Pantheon publish work in thecomics medium, including books such as MarjaneSatrapi’s Persepolis and David B.’s Epileptic. Educa-tional publishers such as Scholastic are also gettingin on the act; in January 2005, Scholastic launchedits own graphic novels imprint, Graphix, with thepublication of Jeff Smith’s highly acclaimed Boneseries. At the NCTE Annual Convention, graphicnovels and comics are displayed in ever greaternumbers. School and public libraries are buildinggraphic novels collections to try to get adolescentsinto the library. Comics have, indeed, emergedfrom the margins into the mainstream.

With all this activity and discussion sur-rounding comics, it is timely to consider how we asliteracy teachers might think about the practice ofusing comics in our classrooms and how this prac-tice fits into ongoing debates about comics and lit-eracy. In examining these links between theory andpractice, I wish to move beyond seeing the readingof comics as a debased or simplified word-based lit-eracy. Instead, I want to advance two ideas: (1) read-ing comics involves a complex, multimodalliteracy; and (2) by using comics in our classrooms,we can help students develop as critical andengaged readers of multimodal texts.

Historically, comics have been viewed as a “debased or simplified word-based literacy,” explainsDale Jacobs, who considers comics to be complex, multimodal texts. Examining Ted Naifeh’s Pollyand the Pirates, Jacobs shows how comics can engage students in multiple literacies, furtheringmeaning-making practices in the classroom and beyond.

Dale Jacobs

More Than Words: Comics as a Means of Teaching Multiple Literacies

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W O R D S A T P L A Y>

19English Journal Vol. 96, No. 3 January 2007

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Text Box

Copyright © 2007 by the National Council of Teachers of English. All rights reserved.

visuality of comics as dangerous, Wertham sharesthe notion with current proponents of comics thatthe visual is more easily ingested and interpreted

than the written. Whetherthe visual acts as a hindranceor a help to the acquisition ofword-based literacy, the keyidea remains that the visual issubservient to the written.

When I was growing upin the 1970s, I never sawcomics in school or in the pub-lic library unless they were

being read surreptitiously behind the cover of a novelor other officially sanctioned book. Over the lastdecade, however, there has been a movement toclaim a value for comics in the literacy education ofchildren. Comics have made their way into schoolsmainly as a scaffold for later learning that is per-ceived to be more difficult, in terms of both the liter-ate practices and content involved. For example,Comics in Education, the online version of Gene Yang’sfinal project for his master’s degree at California StateUniversity, Hayward, embodies thinking that is typ-ical of many educators who advocate the use ofcomics in the classroom. Yang, a teacher and cartoon-ist, claims that the educational strength of comics isthat they are motivating, visual, permanent, inter-mediary, and popular. In emphasizing the motiva-

tional, visual permanency (inthe way it slows down the flowof information), intermediacy,and the popular, suchapproaches inadvertently andironically align themselveswith Wertham’s ideas aboutthe relationship between wordand image, even while bring-ing comics into the main-stream of education. Comics inthis formulation are seen sim-

ply as a stepping stone to the acquisition of other,higher skills. As a teaching tool, then, comics areseen primarily as a way to motivate through theirpopularity and to help slow-learning students, espe-cially in the acquisition of reading skills (see Hau-gaard and Koenke). While I agree with theseattempts to argue for the value of comics in educa-tion, such an approach has limited value.

Libraries have also been important in thereconsideration of the place of comics as appropri-ate texts for children in their literacy learning andacquisition. Recently, many librarians have beenarguing for the introduction of comics into librarycollections, usually in the form of graphic novels, asa way to get children into the library and interestedin reading. The main thrust of this argument isthat the presence of graphic novels will make thelibrary seem cool and interesting, especially amongthe so-called reluctant readers, mainly adolescentboys, who seem to show little interest in reading orin libraries (see Crawford and Simmons). Graphicnovels can compete with video games, television,and movies, giving the library the advantage itneeds to get this specifically targeted demographicthrough the door. Many public libraries and librar-ians have seen the power of comics and graphic nov-els as a tool for drawing young people into thelibrary, getting them first to read those comics andthen building on that scaffold to turn them intolifelong readers. Again, while I agree with theinclusion of comics and graphic novels in librarycollections, such an approach places severe limita-tions on the possibilities of our uses of the mediumas literacy educators.

To think through these ideas, let’s assumethat this strategy has some of its desired effects indrawing reluctant readers into the library andcoaxing them to read. What can we then say aboutthe effects of this approach and its conception ofcomics and their relation to developing literatepractices? On the one hand, the use of graphic nov-els is seen as one strategy in teaching and encour-aging literacy and literate practices; on the otherhand, graphic novels are still regarded as a way sta-tion on the road to “higher” forms of literacy andto more challenging and, by implication, worth-while texts. I’m not trying to suggest that readingcomics or graphic novels exists apart from theworld of word-based texts as a whole or the com-plex matrix of literacy acquisition. Rather, I’msimply pointing out that in the development ofchildren’s and adolescents’ literacies, readingcomics has almost always been seen as a debasedform of word-based literacy, albeit an importantintermediate step to more advanced forms of tex-tual literacy, rather than as a complex form of mul-timodal literacy.

20 January 2007


Comics have made their

way into schools mainly as

a scaffold for later learning

that is perceived to be

more difficult, in terms of

both the literate practices

and content involved.

Again, while I agree with

the inclusion of comics

and graphic novels in

library collections, such

an approach places

severe limitations on the

possibilities of our uses

of the medium as

literacy educators.

EJ_Jan2007_B.qxd 12/7/06 1:22 PM 0

Comics as Multimodal Literacy: The Theory

If we think about comics as multimodal texts thatinvolve multiple kinds of meaning making, we donot give up the benefits of word-based literacyinstruction but strengthen it through the inclusionof visual and other literacies. This complex view ofliteracy is touched on but never fully fleshed out intwo excellent recent articles on comics and educa-tion: Rocco Versaci’s “How Comic Books CanChange the Way Our Students See Literature: OneTeacher’s Perspective” and Bonny Norton’s “TheMotivating Power of Comic Books: Insights fromArchie Comic Readers.” By situating our thinkingabout comics, literacy, and education within aframework that views literacy as occurring in multi-ple modes, we can use comics to greater effectivenessin our teaching at all levels by helping us to armstudents with the critical-literacy skills they need tonegotiate diverse systems of meaning making.

I’m going to offer an example of how comicsengage multiple literacies by looking at TedNaifeh’s Polly and the Pirates, but first let me give abrief outline of these multiple systems of meaningmaking. As texts, comics provide a complex envi-ronment for the negotiation of meaning, beginningwith the layout of the page itself. The comics page isseparated into multiple panels, divided from eachother by gutters, physical or conceptual spacesthrough which connections are made and meaningsare negotiated; readers must fill in the blanks withinthese gutters and make connections between panels.Images of people, objects, animals, and settings,word balloons, lettering, sound effects, and guttersall come together to form page layouts that work tocreate meaning in distinctive ways and in multiplerealms of meaning making. In these multiple realmsof meaning making, comics engage in what theNew London Group of literacy scholars calls multi-modality, a way of thinking that seeks to push liter-acy educators, broadly defined and at all levels ofteaching, to think about literacy in ways that movebeyond a focus on strictly word-based literacy. Inthe introduction to the New London Group’s collec-tion, Multiliteracies: Literacy Learning and the Designof Social Futures, Bill Cope and Mary Kalantzis writethat their approach “relates to the increasing multi-plicity and integration of significant modes of

meaning-making, where the textual is also relatedto the visual, the audio, the spatial, the behavioural,and so on. . . . Meaning is made in ways that areincreasingly multimodal—in which written-lin-guistic modes of meaning are part and parcel ofvisual, audio, and spatial patterns of meaning” (5).By embracing the idea of multimodal literacy inrelation to comics, then, we can help studentsengage critically with ways of making meaning thatexist all around them, since multimodal textsinclude much of the content on the Internet, inter-active multimedia, newspapers, television, film,instructional textbooks, and many other texts in ourcontemporary society.

Such a multimodal approach to reading andwriting asserts that in engaging with texts, weinteract with up to six design elements, includinglinguistic, audio, visual, gestural, and spatialmodes, as well as multimodaldesign, “of a different order tothe others as it represents thepatterns of interconnectionsamong the other modes” (NewLondon Group 25). In the firsttwo pages from Polly and thePirates, all of these design ele-ments are present, including atextual and visual representa-tion of the audio element.Despite the existence of thesemultiple modes of meaningmaking, however, the focus inthinking about the relation-ship between comics and edu-cation is almost always on thelinguistic element, repre-sented here by the words inthe word balloons (or, in theconventions of comics, the dialogue from each of thecharacters) and the narrative text boxes in the firstthree panels (which we later find out are also spokendialogue by a narrator present in the story).

As discussed earlier, comics are seen as a sim-plified version of word-based texts, with the wordssupplemented and made easier to understand bythe pictures. If we take a multimodal approach totexts such as comics, however, the picture of mean-ing making becomes much more complex. In word-based texts, our interaction with words forms an

21English Journal

Dale Jacobs

By embracing the idea of

multimodal literacy in

relation to comics, then,

we can help students

engage critically with

ways of making meaning

that exist all around

them, since multimodal

texts include much of the

content on the Internet,

interactive multimedia,

newspapers, television,

film, instructional

textbooks, and many

other texts in our

contemporary society.

EJ_Jan2007_B.qxd 12/7/06 1:22 PM Page 21

environment for meaning making that is extremelycomplex. In comics and other multimodal texts,there are five other elements added to the mix.Thought about in this way, comics are not just sim-pler versions of word-based texts but can be viewedas the complex textual environments that they are.

Comics as Multimodal Literacy: Polly and the Pirates in the Classroom

In comics, there are elements present besides words,but these elements are just as important in makingmeaning from the text. In fact, it is impossible tomake full sense of the words on the page in isolationfrom the audio, visual, gestural, and spatial. Forexample, the first page of Polly and the Pirates (thefirst issue of a six-issue miniseries) opens with threepanels of words from what the reader takes to be thestory’s narrative voice. Why? Partially it is because ofwhat the words say—how they introduce a characterand begin to set up the story—but also it is becauseof the text boxes that enclose the words. That is,most people understand from their experiences ofreading comics at some point in their history thatwords in text boxes almost always contain the story’snarrative voice and denote a different kind of voicethan do words in dialogue balloons. What’s more,these text boxes deviate in shape and design from theeven rectangles usually seen in comics; instead, theyare depicted more like scrolls, a visual element thatcalls to mind both the time period and genre associ-ated with pirates. Not only does this visual elementhelp to place the reader temporally and generically,but it, along with lettering and punctuation, alsoaids in indicating tone, voice inflection, cadence, andemotional tenor by giving visual representation tothe text’s audio element. We are better able to “hear”the narrator’s voice because we can see what wordsare emphasized by the bold lettering, and we associ-ate particular kinds of voices with the narrative voiceof a pirate’s tale, especially emphasized here by theshape of the text boxes. Both the visual and the audiothus influence the way we read the words in a comic,as can be seen in these three opening panels.

It seems to me, however, that the key lies ingoing beyond the way we make meaning from thewords alone and considering the other visual ele-ments, as well as the gestural and spatial. If I wereteaching this text, I would engage students in a dis-

cussion about how they understand what is goingon in the story and how they make meaning fromit. Depending on the level of the class, I wouldstress different elements at varying levels of com-plexity. Here I will offer an example of how I makemeaning from these pages and of some of the ele-ments I might discuss with students.

In talking about the visual, I would considersuch things as the use of line and white space, shading,perspective, distance, depth of field, and composition.The gestural refers to facial expression and body pos-ture, while the spatial refers to the meanings of envi-ronmental and architectural space, which, in the case ofcomics, can be conceived as the layout of panels on thepage and the relation between these panels through useof gutter space. The opening panel depicts a ship,mainly in silhouette, sailing on the ocean; we are not

22 January 2007


Polly and the Pirates ™ and © 2006 Ted Naifeh. Published byOni Press Inc. Used with permission.


given details, but instead see the looming presence of aship that we are led to believe is a pirate ship by thewords in the text boxes. The ship is in the center of anunbordered panel and is the only element in focus,though its details are obscured. The unbordered panelindicates openness, literally and metaphorically, andthis opening shot thus acts much in the same way as anestablishing shot in a film, orienting us both in termsof place and in terms of genre. The second panel pullsin closer to reveal a silhouetted figure standing on thedeck of the ship. She is framed between the sails, andthe panel’s composition draws our eyes toward her asthe central figure in the frame. She is clearly at home,one arm thrust forward while the other points backwith sword in hand, her legs anchoring herself securelyas she gazes across the ocean. The third panel pulls ineven farther to a close-up of her face, the top half in

shadow and the bottom half showing a slight smile.She is framed by her sword on the left and the riggingsof the ship on the right, perfectly in her element, yetobscured from our view. Here and in the previouspanel, gestural and visual design indicate who is thecenter of the story and the way in which she confi-dently belongs in this setting. At the same time, thespatial layout of the page and the progression of thepanels from establishing shot to close-up and fromunbordered panels to bordered and internally framedpanels help us to establish the relationship of thewoman to the ship and to the story; as we move fromone panel to the next, we must make connectionsbetween the panels that are implied by the gutter. Lin-guistic, visual, audio, gestural, and spatial elementscombine in these first three panels to set up expecta-tions in the reader for the type of story and its narrativeapproach. Taken together, these elements form a multi-modal system of meaning making.

What happens in the fourth panel serves toundercut these expectations as we find out that the nar-rative voice actually belongs to one of the characters inthe story, as evidenced by the shift from text box to dia-logue balloon even though the voice is clearly the sameas in the first three panels of the page. Spatially, we arepresented with a larger panel that is visually dominatedby the presence of a book called A History of the PirateQueen. This book presumablydetails the story to which we hadbeen introduced in the first threepanels. The character holdingthe book is presenting it tosomeone and, because of thepanel’s composition, is also effec-tively presenting it to us, thereaders. The gesture becomesone of offering this story up tous, a story that simultaneouslybecomes a romance as well as apirate story as evidenced by thewords the character says and theway she says them (with thebold emphasis on dream and marry). At this point, we donot know who this character is or to whom she is speak-ing, and the answers to these questions will be deferreduntil we turn to the second page.

On the first panel of page 2, we see three girls,each taking up about a third of the panel, withthem and the background in focused detail. Both

23English Journal

Dale Jacobs

We are better able to

“hear” the narrator’s voice

because we can see what

words are emphasized by

the bold lettering, and we

associate particular kinds

of voices with the

narrative voice of a

pirate’s tale, especially

emphasized here by the

shape of the text boxes.

Polly and the Pirates ™ and © 2006 Ted Naifeh. Published byOni Press Inc. Used with permission.


the words and facial expression of the first girl indi-cate her stance toward the story, while the wordsand facial expression of the second girl indicate her

indignation at the attitude ofthe first girl (whom we learnis named Sarah). The thirdgirl is looking to the right,away from the other two, andhas a blank expression on herface. The next panel depictsthe second and third girls,pulling in to a tighter close-up that balances one girl andeither side of the panel andobscures the background sothat we will focus on theirfaces and dialogue. Theunbordered panel again indi-cates openness and momen-

tary detachment from their surroundings. Polly isat a loss for words and is not paying attention to theother girl, as indicated by the ellipses and truncateddialogue balloons, as well as her eyes that are point-ing to the right, away from the other girl. Spatially,the transition to panel 3 once more encloses themin the world that we now see is a classroom in anoverhead shot that places the students in relation tothe teacher. The teacher’s words restore order to theclass and, on a narrative level, name the third of thethree girls and the narrative voice of the openingpage. The story of the pirates that began on page 1is now contained within the world of school, andwe are left to wonder how the tensions betweenthese two stories/worlds will play out in theremaining pages. As you can see, much more thanwords alone is used to make meaning in these firsttwo pages of Polly and the Pirates.

Conclusion

My process of making meaning from these pages ofPolly and the Pirates is one of many meanings withinthe matrix of possibilities inherent in the text. As areader, I am actively engaging with the “gram-mars,” including discourse and genre conventions,within this multimodal text as I seek tocreate/negotiate meaning; such a theory of meaningmaking with multimodal texts acknowledges thesocial and semiotic structures that surround us and

within which we exist, while at the same time itrecognizes individual agency and experience in thecreation of meaning. Knowledge of linguistic,audio, visual, gestural, and spatial conventionswithin comics affects the ways in which we readand the meanings we assign to texts, just as knowl-edge of conventions within word-based literacyaffects the ways in which those texts are read. Forexample, the conventions discussed above in termsof the grammar of comics would have been avail-able to Naifeh as he created Polly and the Pirates,just as they are also available to me and to all otherreaders of his text. These conventions form theunderlying structure of the process of makingmeaning, while familiarity with these conventions,practice in reading comics, interest, prior experi-ence, and attention given to that reading all comeinto play in the exercise of agency on the part of thereader (and writer). Structure and agency interact sothat we are influenced by design conventions andgrammars as we read but are not determined bythem; though we are subject to the same set ofgrammars, my reading of the text is not necessarilythe same as that of someone else.

Reading and writing multimodal texts, then,is an active process, both for creators and for read-ers who by necessity engage in the active produc-tion of meaning and who use all resources availableto them based on their familiarity with the comicsmedium and its inherent grammars, their histo-ries, life experiences, and interests. In turn, everyact of creating meaning from a multimodal text,happening as it does at the intersection of structureand agency, contributes to the ongoing process ofbecoming a multimodally literate person. Byteaching students to become conscious and criticalof the ways in which they make meaning frommultimodal texts such as comics, we can also teachstudents to become more literate with a wide rangeof multimodal texts. By complicating our view ofcomics so that we do not see them as simply anintermediary step to more complex word-based lit-eracy, we can more effectively help studentsbecome active creators, rather than passive con-sumers, of meaning in their interactions with awide variety of multimodal texts. In doing so, weharness the real power of comics in the classroomand prepare students for better negotiating theirworlds of meaning.

24 January 2007


Knowledge of linguistic,

audio, visual, gestural,

and spatial conventions

within comics affects the

ways in which we read

and the meanings we

assign to texts, just as

knowledge of

conventions within

word-based literacy

affects the ways in which

those texts are read.


Works CitedB., David. Epileptic. New York: Pantheon, 2005.Cope, Bill, and Mary Kalantzis. “Introduction: Multilitera-

cies: The Beginnings of an Idea.” Multiliteracies: LiteracyLearning and the Design of Social Futures. Ed. Bill Copeand Mary Kalantzis. New York: Routledge, 2000. 3–8.

Crawford, Philip. “A Novel Approach: Using Graphic Nov-els to Attract Reluctant Readers.” Library Media Con-nection 22.5 (2004): 26–28.

Dorrell, Larry D., Dan B. Curtis, and Kuldip R. Rampal.“Book-Worms without Books? Students ReadingComic Books in the School House.” Journal of PopularCulture 29 (Fall 1995): 223–34.

Haugaard, Kay. “Comic Books: Conduits to Culture?” TheReading Teacher 27.1 (October 1973): 54–55.

Koenke, Karl. “The Careful Use of Comic Books.” TheReading Teacher 34.5 (February 1981): 592–95.

McCloud, Scott. Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art.New York: Harper, 1993.

Naifeh, Ted. Polly and the Pirates 1 (Sept. 2005): 1–2.New London Group, The. “A Pedagogy of Multiliteracies:

Designing Social Futures.” Multiliteracies: LiteracyLearning and the Design of Social Futures. Ed. Bill Copeand Mary Kalantzis. New York: Routledge, 2000.9–37.

Norton, Bonny. “The Motivating Power of Comic Books:Insights from Archie Comic Readers.” The ReadingTeacher 57.2 (2003): 140–47.

Satrapi, Marjane. Persepolis. New York: Pantheon, 2003.Simmons, Tabitha. “Comic Books in My Library?” PNLA

Quarterly 67.3 (2003): 12, 20.Versaci, Rocco. “How Comic Books Can Change the Way

Our Students See Literature: One Teacher’s Perspec-tive.” English Journal 91.2 (2001): 61–67.

Wertham, Fredric. Seduction of the Innocent. New York: Rine-hart, 1954.

Yang, Gene. Comics in Education. 2003. 29 Aug. 2006 <http://www.humblecomics.com/comicsedu/index.html>.

25English Journal

Dale Jacobs

Dale Jacobs teaches composition and rhetoric at the University of Windsor. He is the editor of The Myles Horton Reader: Edu-cation for Social Change, and his articles have appeared in JAC, Composition Studies, and the National Writing Project Quar-terly. email: [email protected].

EJ 25 Years Ago

Graffiti Juggles the Balls of Whimsy

But most important perhaps, graffiti nicely shows how humor varies in its tone or stance. It shows a continuumof widely-different attitudes from light to dark. This broad band extends all the way from sheer whimsy andcaprice, sunny and playful, to the garden-variety comic, then on to dry wit, including parody and repartee andof course satire and irony (both heavy sarcasm and subtler understatement), and finally black humor and thegrotesque and absurd, all cloudiness now. . . . Graffiti is great for teaching about poetic and other stepped-uplanguage. . . . But foremost, graffiti’s for humor, the guffaw, the chuckle, the smile. Kids like how graffiti jug-gles the balls of whimsy in the air in sheer sportiveness and how it uses wit to nail a target to the wall.

James P. Beck. “Graffiti: The Vulgar Blackboard’s Wit.” EJ 71.3 (1982):73–74.

READWRITETHINK CONNECTION

Jacobs persuasively states the need for comics in the classroom and presents a way of using them. TheReadWriteThink lesson plan “The Comic Book Show and Tell” introduces the use of comics in the classroom.Students learn about the people involved in making comic books and learn the centrality of the script to theprocess. They craft comic-book scripts using clear, accurate, descriptive, and detailed writing that shows(illustrates) and tells (directs). After peers create an artistic interpretation of the script, students revise their originalscripts. http://www.readwritethink.org/lessons/lesson_view.asp?id=921


dale jacobs more than words: comics as a means of teaching

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