RKMBs Forums .::Important::. off topic and offensive posts Academics Question Batman's Sexuality, DC Unimpressed

Lingua Franca, a prestigious online academic journal, has questioned DC's seemingly inconsistent reaction to requests from academics to reprint Batman material.

In reference to a specific request for copyrighted material by Chris York, a graduate student in American Studies, the article quotes well known comics' academic John Lent as asserting "DC's decision not to grant permission to York was 'corporate censorship' motivated in part by 'homophobia.'"

This position is supported by University of Calgary professor Bart Beaty, co-editor of the forthcoming International Encyclopedia of Comics (Routledge). Additionally Beaty maintains that "Writing about comics by only quoting the written text is like writing about Shakespeare by only quoting the stage directions."

York's article "All in the Family: Homophobia and Batman Comics in the 1950s" was accepted by Lent's International Journal of Comic Art in May 2000, but the graduate student had difficulty obtaining permission to use four panels that appeared in various Batman comics in the 1950s due to DC reluctance to grant such permissions to scholarly works that discuss Batman's sexual orientation. York's entire article rests on detailed interpretation of the aforementioned panels.

"There have been literally hundreds of permissions granted by DC for inclusion of material we've published in scholarly works ranging from articles to books," stated DC's Barbara Rich. No such permission was forthcoming for York's scholarship, however.
http://www.silverbulletcomicbooks.com/index.htm?contents=news/viewnews.cgi?newsid983068101,67263,