KOMIKUSU, AN INDIE MANGA ROUNDTABLE ON TCJ

Just wanted to share that I recently was invited to take part in a roundtable series of essays on The Comics Journal's column, The Hooded Utilitarian, which is an outpost for comics critic Noah Berlatsky (and a slew of guest contributors) to talk seriously about comics.



The roundtable was called "Komikusu: Selling Awesome Manga" and was focused around "indie manga"-- what it is, the challenges of finding a readership, and how to get more people turned onto the quirkier and underground titles out there.



Other folks included were:

• Kate Dacey of The Manga Critic.
• Brigid Alverson of lots of places, inlcuding Mangablog.
• Erica Friedman of Okazu.
• Shaenon Garrity who writes at tcj.com.
• Deb Aoki of About.com.
• Ed Chavez of Vertical.

My contribution, "Indie is as indie does" meanders a lot and doesn't quite make its points very clearly, but I tried to tackle the history of manga released in the states and how it has been positioned via genre/publisher. And also the idea that a title being referred to as "indie" in the States often has little to do with how it was originally published/received in Japan. Or something? Give it a read and tell me what you think!



I encourage you guys to check out the entire roundtable when you have some free time!