The 2016 McDuffie Awards get flooded with submissions
One of the most rewarding things I did all last year was participate as a judge for the first ever McDuffie Award for Diversity in Comics; not only was I exposed to a lot of great comics material I had never seen before, but I worked with a fine panel of judges and it was a genuine joy to get more attention for the eventual winner–Nilah McGruder's MFK.
Happily, I'll be part of the final selection committee for this year's awards, with the winner to be announced at the Long Beach Comic Expo on Saturday February 20, in room S5 from 2:30pm - 3:30pm.
MLK Day 2016 to read: Books and dozens of black-themed webcomics
A few reminders for Martin Luther King Day today.
As always, the 1956 Martin Luther King "Montgomery Story" Comic Book is available free to...
The Black Comic Book Festival drew 5000 people
https://twitter.com/blicqer/status/688898644632825857
https://twitter.com/theblerdgurl/status/688484747992002560
The Black Comic Book Festival, held at the Schomburg Center in Harlem, just has its 4th outing on Saturday and by all accounts it...
Soon you can play with Rey in Monopoly
https://twitter.com/HasbroNews/status/684555948959096832
The people have spoken. And Hasbro listened. Two for diversity in two days! After all the hue and cry about there not being a...
Alors! Florence Cestac says Franck Bondoux is “un crétin total.”
Whooooo-ah! This whole Angoulême-gate thing got out of hand FAST. In just 24 hours it went from an angry petition to the world's best cartoonists rejecting their nominations to front page news to the festival sulkily added Marjane Satrapi and Posy Simmonds to their list, even though no one would vote for them, and a whirlwind of hot takes.
FiBD grudgingly to add names to Grand Prix nominee list
It seems that the Festival of Comics of Angoulême is grudgingly going to add more names to it's Grand Prix list after a growing...
Sattouf, Clowes, Burns, Davodeau and Sfar and even MIlo Manara withdraw from Grand Prix...
As reported yesterday, there has been international consternation over the 016 list of nominees for the Grand Prix, the lifetime achievement awards for cartoonists...
Call for boycott of Angoulême’s Grand Prix nominees after list includes only men
The long list for the 2016 Grand Prix at Angoulême was announced today—this is a kind of lifetime achivemenet award, and arguably the greatest honor...
UPDATED: What is Hasbro’s problem: no Rey in Force Awakens Monopoly
Update: I've written to Hasbro reps several times about these issues and never gotten an answer, however when Entertainment Weekly writes, they DO respond...
Ariell R. Johnson: “Sometimes we want to be the hero, too.”
Based on the astounding social media attention to my last post about Ariell R. Johnson and her Amalgam Comics & Coffeehouse in Philadelphia, it seems you want more Ariell. So I am very happy to oblige with the above video of Johnson talking at the Ignite Philly event last fall. Johnson talks about her own life as a nerd, who was the black Thundercat and her discovery of Storm, the first black superheroine she encountered: "When I found out about Storm I gripped on tight to her and never let her go."
Philadelphia woman opens comics shop that focuses on diversity and coffee
I can't think of a better story to end this year with than that of Ariell R. Johnson, reportedly the East coasts first black...
Why are there so few black voices in editorial cartooning?
And by few I mean a handful. Michael Cavna reports on this in a powerful piece called Why are there no staff black cartoonists at a time when we need them most? He spotlights a few of the black cartoonist who have a voice, including Keith Knight, Darrin Bell, and, Congressman John Lewism who thought not actually a cartoonist has certainly become a voice in comics. But the numbers are still awful:
