Dr Chris Murray - Lecturer & Programme Convenor
Contact Details
E-Mail : C.Murray@dundee.ac.uk
Telephone: (01382) 38-4907
Room Location: 2.10, Tower Extension
Research Interests
Dr Murray's research interests are in comics, film and popular culture, specifically the theorisation of how popular visual culture relates to other discourses (literature, art, and politics).
Dr Murray has published on various aspects of comics, including:
- the relationship between American superhero comics, popular culture and propaganda during World War Two;
- the comics of Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman and Grant Morrison;
- Independent/small press comics (mini-comics);
- British comics, specifically DC Thomson.
Chris is editor (along with Dr Julia Round) of new peer-reviewed comics journal, Studies in Comics (Intellect Books). He is Secretary of the Scottish Word and Image Group, which researches aspects of the relationship between verbal and visual representation.
Find out more about comics at Dundee.
Publications
Books
Champions of the Oppressed: Superhero Comics, Propaganda and Popular Culture in America During World War Two (New Jersey, USA: Hampton Press, 2011).
Articles & Book Chapters
“These are not our Promised Resurrections…” in Alan Moore and the Gothic Tradition, ed. by Matt Green (Forthcoming 2011, Manchester University Press).
“Denise Mina’s Hellblazer and the Triumph of Scottish Schadenfreude”, in Gothic Studies, Special Issue in Contemporary Scottish Gothic, ed. by Monica Germana (Forthcoming 2011, Manchester University Press).
“The Pleasures of Persuasion: Comics and Propaganda”, in Critical Approaches to Comics and Graphic Novels, ed. by Matthew Smith and Randy Duncan (Forthcoming 2011, Routledge).
“Signals from Airstrip One: The British Invasion of American Mainstream Comics” in The Rise of the American Comics Artist: Creators and their Contexts ed. by Paul Williams and James Lyon (Jackson: University of Mississippi Press, 2010), pp.31-45 (ISBN: 978-1-60473-792-9).
"Islands of Memory: The Science Fiction Films of Andrei Tarkovsky", in Alienation and Resistance ed. by Gordon Spark, Laura Findlay, Pauline MacPherson and Andrew Wood (Cambridge Scholar's Press, 2010), pp.96-114 (ISBN (10): 1-4438-1964-6, ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-1964-0).
“Subverting the Sublime: Romantic Ideology in the Comics of Grant Morrison” in Sub/versions: Genre, Cultural Status and Critique , edited by Pauline MacPherson, Christopher Murray, Gordon Spark and Kevin Corstorphine ( Newcastle : Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2008), pp.34-51 (ISBN (10): 1-84718-372-7, ISBN (13): 9781847183729).
"Biff! Bam!! Crikey!!!: A Comics Conference in Dundee", in The International Journal of Comic Art, ed. by John Lent, 10:1 (2008)
“Thur’s a Man wi a Big Chin an’ a Dug in Thon City Centre: The Importance of Dundee ’s Comics”, in The Scottish Society for Art History Journal, Special Dundee Issue, ed. by Matthew Jarron (November 2006)
“Noble Enterprises: Strip for Me and The British Small Press”, in The International Journal of Comic Art, ed. by John Lent, 7:2 (2005)
“My Mouth is Quiet But My Mind is Noisy: The Work of John Watson”, with Joyce Walker and Douglas Webster, in The International Journal of Comic Art, ed. by John Lent, 5:2 (2003)
“Superman vs Imago: Superheroes, Lacan and Mediated Identity”, in The International Journal of Comic Art, ed. by John Lent, 4:2 (2002)
“Rhetoric and Response: Superheroes and World War Two”, in Comics and Culture, ed. by Anne Magnussen and Hans Christian Christiansen (Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, 2000).
Online Publications
"Holy Hypertexts! - The Pose of Post-modernity in Comics and Graphic Novels of the 1980s", in Reflections on Creativity, ed. by H van Koten (Dundee: Duncan of Jordanstone College, 2007).
[ISBN: 1 899837 56 6 <http://artanddesign.dundee.ac.uk/reflections/abstracts/ChrisMurray.htm>]
Debating the Difference: Essays on Gender, Representation and
Self-Representation
, ed. by Christopher Murray, Keith Williams, Rachel
Jones and Hamid Van Koten (Dundee: Duncan of Jordanstone College,
2010).
[ISBN: 1 899 83760 4
<http://www.scottishwordimage.org/debatingdifference/>]
Encyclopedia Entries
Entry on Comics Theory for Blackwell’s Encyclopedia of Cultural Theory, ed. by M. Keith Booker.
Entry on Comics and Graphic Novels for Encyclopaedia Britannica.
Various entries on comics for Greenwood’s Encyclopedia of Comics and Graphic Novels, ed. by M. Keith Booker.
Entry on Film Theory, with Brian Hoyle for Blackwell’s Encyclopedia of Cultural Theory, ed. by M. Keith Booker.
Magazines
“Comics and Culture Conference”, in Comics Forum (London: Comics Creator's Guild, 1999)
Selected TV and Podcast Appearances
- "Sexism and Propaganda in Wartime Comics", Woman's Hour (2 August 2011) <http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b012wg2l>
- "Panel Culture: The Changing Landscape of Comics", MaekstarProductions (2011) <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNkiV2-B_hk>
- "Scotland's Amazing Comic Book Heroes", ArtWorks Scotland, BBC (11 Jul 2011) <http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b012c5n2>
News and Online Articles
- Sneddon, L., "On the Scene: Dundee Comics Day", The Beat (6 November 2012) <http://comicsbeat.com/on-the-scene-dundee-comics-day/>
- Review of Dundee Comics Day 2012: Part 2, downthetubes.net (1 November 2012) <http://downthetubescomics.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/photo-review-dundee-comics-day-2012.html>
- Review of Dundee Comics Day 2012: Part 1, downthetubes.net (29 October 2012) <http://downthetubescomics.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/photo-review-dundee-comics-day-2012.html>
- Interview with Chris Murray: "Treating Comics Seriously - Six Questions for Dr Chris Murray", downthetubes.net (22 October 2011) <http://downthetubescomics.blogspot.com/2011/10/treating-comics-seriously-six-questions.html>
- Review of Dundee Comics Day 2011, downthetubes.net (5 November 2011) <http://downthetubescomics.blogspot.com/2011/11/photo-review-dundee-comics-day-2011.html>
- Café Arts talk on DC Thomson Comics at McManus Galleries, Dundee (11 December 2010) <http://www.thecourier.co.uk/News/Dundee/article/8449/dundee-comics-a-serious-success-story-says-university-expert.html>
- Review of Dundee Comics Day 2010, downthetubes.net (2 May 2010) <http://downthetubescomics.blogspot.com/2010/05/dundee-comics-day-2010.html>
- Review of Dundee Comics Day 2009, downthetubes.net (1 July 2009) <http://downthetubescomics.blogspot.com/2009/07/in-review-timeframes-dundee.html
- Review of Dundee Comics Day 2008, downthetubes.net (24 June 2008) <http://downthetubescomics.blogspot.com/2008/06/in-review-dundee-literary-festival.html>
- Review of Dundee Comics Day 2008, metaphrog blog (24 June 2008) <http://metaphrog.blogspot.com/2008/06/comics-day-at-dundee-lit-fest-photo.html>
- "Having a laugh", BBC Radio Wales (21 August 2007) <http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/radiowales/sites/roynoble/updates/20070821.shtml>
- Malvern, Jack, "The new adventures of Dennis the Menace, direct to your mobile", Times Online (20 August 2007) <http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article2289162.ece>
- Jamieson, Alastair, "It's time to take cartoon capers seriously ... even academically", The Scotsman (26 May 2007) <http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=819012007>
- "Capers at comics conference", The Courier (26 May 2007) <http://www.thecourier.co.uk/output/2007/05/26/newsstory9769993t0.asp>
- "Jings! Comic lovers come to city", BBC News (25 May 2007) <http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/tayside_and_central/6691397.stm>
- "Six Cities Design Festival", The List, 575 (8 May 2007), <http://www.list.co.uk/article/2018-six-cities-design-festival/>
- Hainey, Raymond, "Bash Street School gets its first new pupil for 50 years", The Scotsman (28 April 2007) <http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=655052007>
- "City hosts major comic conference", BBC News (23 April 2007) <http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/tayside_and_central/6583215.stm>
- Dalgarno, Paul, "Wonder Woman helps launch pioneering research centre", The Sunday Herald (26 March 2006) <http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4156/is_20060326/ai_n16177897>
- Tavares, Marcus, "Spider-Man: A good model for kids?", Rio Media, <http://tinyurl.com/24e7pt>

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