Gene Luen Yang

SkypeTacular! Behind the Mask: [Re] creating the First Asian-American Superhero

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Fri. 2.27.15, 3pm Ft. Howard Theater, St. Norbert College 

Gene Luen Yang, Chinese American writer and drawer of award-winning comics and graphic novels, just wrote “The Shadow Hero,” a revival of the first ever Asian-American superhero. Yang works for the popular series “Avatar: the Last Airbender.” His graphic novel American Born Chinese (2006), Publishers Weekly’s Best Comic of the Year, is the first graphic novel to be nominated for a National Book Award and the first to win the American Library Association’s Printz Award.  His most recent book, Boxers and Saints is also up for a National Book Award. Yang’s Catholicism informs his writing as well; he teaches in Hamline University’s MFA in Writing for Children/Young Adults.

Installment three of the Cassandra Voss Center’s “SkypeTacular” series asks--how do you create an Asian-American superhero? Gene Luen Yang discusses racial identity in comic books and how to illustrate it all to a national audience.