CALL FOR PAPERS: TRANSITIONS 8 – new directions in comics studies 2018 Birkbeck, University of London Saturday 10th November 2018 After a year’s hiatus we are delighted to announce this call for papers for the interdisciplinary Transitions 2018 symposium. Originally convened by PhD students in 2010, Transitions at Birkbeck is a platform for emerging research that is free to attend and participate in. This event is focused towards postgraduate and early career speakers, and usually draws a diverse crowd of both new and more established researchers, as well as creators, aficionados and other interested parties. Our aim is to build connections between comics scholars working in diverse academic departments and contexts, to provide a platform for productive debate, and to create a space from which further collaborations can emerge. Keynote speaker: Dr Maggie Gray (Kingston University, London), author of Alan Moore, Out from the Underground: Cartooning, Performance, and Dissent (Palgrave 2017) Respondent: Professor Roger Sabin (University of the Arts London) Rather than adopting a narrow theme, the shape and identity of the programme will emerge from the submitted papers. We thus welcome abstracts for 20-minute papers, or pre-constituted panels of three, on topics including (but not limited to): Comics, comix, comic strips, graphic novels, manga, manhwa, bande dessinée Superheroes, adventure, war, horror, fantasy, crime, romance, humour & other genres; documentary/historical/journalistic comics, autobiographical/biographical modes , graphic medicine Politics of representation in comics, formal approaches, transgressive comics, educational and didactic comics, comics for young adults & children Readers and fandoms, creators, comics & the law, publishing histories, web-comics & comics exhibitions, transnational circulation, political economy of comics You can apply by email to  transitionssymposium@gmail.com. Please attach your abstract of 250-300 words plus a short biographical note (preferably as a Word document), indicating ‘abstract’ in the email subject line and your name in the file’s title. The deadline for submissions is Friday August 24th 2018. We aim to notify applicants by Monday September 17th. With best wishes, The Transition Team   Image from Terry McCombs, used under a CC BY-NC 2.0...