In the introduction of the recently published anthology Coraline: A Closer Look at Studio LAIKA’s Stop-Motion Witchcraft, editor Mihaela Mihailova writes, “Like witchcraft, puppet craft remains poorly understood and frequently branded as a relic of a bygone era — and…
Review of Stevie Suan. Anime’s Identity: Performativity and Form Beyond Japan. United States, University of Minnesota Press, 2021. Traditional scholarship on anime has left the identity of the media form as de facto Japanese, reducing a global industrial network into…
Review of Jez Stewart, The Story of British Animation, London: British Film Institute, Bloomsbury, 2021. Jez Stewart’s role as a curator at the BFI National Archive positions him well as author of this detailed history of British animation. The book…
Review of Nea Ehrlich, Animating Truth: Documentary and Visual Culture in the 21st Century, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2021. For those of us who are interested in nonfictional animation, Nea Ehrlich’s new book is, to tell the truth, a proper…
Review of Omar Sayfo, Arab Animation: Images of Identity, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2021. Probably the first extensive dedication to the subject, Arab Animation: Images of Identity is a major contribution to the diverse world of Arab and international animation…
Review of Donna Kornhaber, Dream Sanctuary: War and the Animated Film. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press, 2020. When one thinks about wartime animated films, propaganda film comes to most people’s mind. Indeed, since the 1990s, studies in animated propaganda developed…
Review of Caroline Ruddell and Paul Ward (eds.). The Crafty Animator: Handmade, Craft-Based Animation and Cultural Value. Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019. The Crafty Animator: Handmade, Craft-based Animation and Cultural Value is a coherent collection of essays centered around the production of…
Review of Daisy Yan Du. Animated Encounters: Transnational Movements of Chinese Animation 1940s-1970s. University of Hawai’i Press, 2019. Daisy Yan Du’s excellent Animated Encounters: Transnational Movements of Chinese Animation 1940s-1970s is essential reading for anyone interested in Chinese or Japanese…
Review of Masao Yokota and Tze-yue G. Hu (eds.). Japanese Animation: East Asian Perspectives. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2013. This book was put together by a prominent clinical psychologist with a long experience in the psychological dimensions of animation…
Review of Meike Uhrig (ed.). Emotion in Animated Films. New York/London: Routledge, 2018. Emotion in Animated Films explores the rich territory of emotions and their representation within animated films, particularly with a view on emotions as represented within computer animation. Books…
