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Misra, Aditya. Theorizing the Superhero: Performativity and politics. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2024. Added by: joachim (21/02/2026, 15:03) Last edited by: joachim (06/03/2026, 15:40) |
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| Resource type: Book Language: en: English Published DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-62933-4 ID no. (ISBN etc.): 978-3-031-62932-7 BibTeX citation key: Misra2024 Email resource to friend View all bibliographic details  |
Categories: General Keywords: "Bantul the Great", Asia, Debnath. Narayan, India, Philosophy, Politics, Superhero Creators: Misra Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan (Cham) |
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This book uses contemporary continental philosophy to develop an alternative theory of the superhero to the one currently offered by the comic book industry and comic book studies. Studying superheroes from South Asian pop culture, this book questions the definition of the superhero and the allegedly sacrosanct nature of its origin and identity in comic books. This book looks at the superhero as a performative figure and explores how the superheroic imagination opens up diverse modes of creative thinking. Superheroes studied in this book include Narayan Debnath’s Bantul the Great (comics), Premendra Mitra’s Ghanashyam Das or Ghanada (Tall Tale), Satyajit Ray’s Professor Trilokeswar Shonku (science fiction/fantasy fiction), and one of the nine gems of Emperor Akbar’s court, Raja Birbar or Birbal (mediaeval Indian history). By virtue of perpetual reconfiguration of its elements, the book argues, the concept of the superhero makes itself ‘always new’ and it is always already ‘open onto elsewhere’.
Added by: joachim Last edited by: joachim |