Rethinking webcomics : webcomics as a screen based medium

2013

So far, webcomics, or online comics, have been discussed mostly in terms of ideologies of the Internet such as participatory culture or Open Source. Not much thought, however, has been given to webcomics as a new way of making comics that need to be studied in their own right. In this thesis a diverse set of webcomics such as Questionable Content, A Softer World and FreakAngels is analyzed using a combination of N. Katherine Hayles’ Media Specific Analysis (MSA) and the neo-semiotics of comics by Thierry Groensteen. By contrasting print- and web editions of webcomics, as well as looking at web-only webcomics and their methods for structuring and creating stories, this thesis shows that webc…