Winthrop Professors, Student to Present at Dragon Con This Weekend

Quick Facts

Dragon*Con is a four-day pop culture convention focusing on science fiction, fantasy, games, comics and more.

Presenting from Winthrop are assistant English education professor Robert Prickett, assistant English professors Casey Cothran and Leslie Bickford, University College assistant dean Nakia Pope and student Miri Smith.

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Robert Prickett

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Casey Cothran

ROCK HILL, S.C. -- Tens of thousands of people will descend upon Atlanta this weekend for Dragon*Con, a four-day pop culture convention focusing on science fiction, fantasy, comics, gaming and more. Four Winthrop University professors and a student will play a role in the convention through presentations related to gender roles in the graphic novel Watchmen, the rising popularity of comics in the classroom and the heroine predicament in best-selling trilogies, including The Hunger Games.

Assistant English education professor Robert Prickett and assistant English professor Casey Cothran learned of the academic conference portion of Dragon*Con through one of Cothran’s colleagues. The two, along with assistant English professor Leslie Bickford and University College assistant dean Nakia Pope, answered the call for proposals. Also attending is English major Miri Smith.

Presentations include:

Friday: “Men in Masks: Traditional Masculinity and Violations Thereof in Watchmen” by Mirielle Smith.

Saturday: “Comics, Critical Thinking and the Canon” in which Pope and Bickford discuss the pedagogical possibilities that arise as comics are increasingly used in the college classroom

Monday: “Why Am I Not Dead?: The Dystopian Heroine’s Happy (?) Ending,” presented by Cothran and Prickett. The presentation explores three young adult trilogies—The Hunger Games, The Uglies and The Forest of Hands and Teeth—and determines the consequences the endings have on the heroines, the narratives and the readers.

For more information on Dragon*Con visit the official website.

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