Rebecca B. Vargha SLA Education Division July10, 2015.

Graphic Novels: Adventures in Collecting

Rebecca B. VarghaSLA Education Division July10, 2015

Defined by Stephen Weiner in his book, “Faster Than a Speeding Bullet: The Rise of the Graphic Novel.”

Graphic Novels

DC Comics releases Watchmen in 1986…

Batman: The Dark Knight Returns also in 1986…

Maus by Art Spiegelman

Superman-Man of Steel

Why collect?

LIS Program School of Education Department of English Department of Germanic Languages

University of North Carolina Chapel Hill

David Carr’s question: “What kind of institution do we wish to be?”

Institutional portrait• Purpose• Understanding users• Growth for the institution?• Changing world of the user?

CollectionsAccording to Carr:• Where is the center?• Is the collection alive and in motion?

Breen Collection in 2003 26,000 items Collection weighed more than 2 tons

Sustainability Cost of processing Format challenges

Preservation and formats

American culture-scholarly study

Public and school libraries SILS Students Papers indexed in LISS and available here: https://

cdr.lib.unc.edu/search?action=setFacet%3apath%2c%223%2cuuid%3a94f2df65-25e7-474d-a0b6-2fdc0f305b1e!4%22&facets=path:2,uuid:2f5733dc-e5d6-4822-ab7f-8832ef66cec8

LIS Connections

Rebecca B. Vargha [email protected]

Thank you!