Dr Mel Comics
Mel Gibson is a UK based comics scholar and consultant. She has run training and promotional events about comics and graphic novels for libraries, schools and other organizations since 1993 when she contributed to Graphic Account on developing graphic novels collections for 16-25 year olds, published by the Youth Libraries Group.
As a consultant, Mel runs training events on manga, working with young adults in libraries, working with picture books and the links between children's books and the Internet.
This site incorporates information about her training and promotional work, but also offers Links that will help you in developing graphic novel, comics and manga collections and events. It also contains a starter document for assessing comics strip materials for stock selection in libraries.
Further, via this site you can access the materials Mel created for Learning and Teaching Scotland on Graphic Novels in the Curriculum. This builds on work she has done in the past, such as producing bibliographies under the title Books with Attitude, for library supplier Farries and as a contributor to the comics e-zine Sequential Tart.
Mel is a researcher and lecturer, as well as a trainer. She is a Senior Lecturer at Northumbria University specialising in teaching and research relating to children and young people, literature and media and has a huge interest in visual literacies. She is a National Teaching Fellow and writes about Teaching and Learning in Higher Education in the UK. This writing has also encompassed advising on successfully completing a Humanities PhD in Britain. Tome Reader offers support, guidance and humour about this particular academic challenge.
Her doctoral thesis was on British women's memories of their girlhood comics reading, which ties in to her training work, and her MA thesis also focused on comics. She has published a number of articles and chapters related to this research and about other aspects of comics, graphic novels and manga. She has presented papers at many conferences and has been involved in organising strands on comics, pedagogy and visual literacies. She is part of a team organising a conference on comics for 2009 called Visual Narrative Media in Britain from Ally Sloper to Judge Dredd.
In addition, she teaches modules in both Children's Literature in Context and Picture Books and Comics for the Developing Reader and has published in this area too.
Finally, Mel is, additionally, a reviewer for Writeaway and Inis, the Children's Books Ireland magazine amongst others and currently represents the Northern branch of the Youth Libraries Group as their Carnegie and Kate Greenaway Medals judge.
She has worked extensively with television and radio, promoting and enthusing about comics, graphic novels and manga, including the BBC4 series Comics Britannia.
Mel runs an occasional blog at myspace.com/dr_mel_comics.
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Last update: 16th June 2008.
