xe02c twitter xe037 facebook xe036 linkedin xe039 google+ xe024 e mail if a picture is worth a thousand words, nick sousanis likes to joke, his dissertation has exceeded the standard length and then some. Sousanis, a sixth year doctoral candidate in interdisciplinary studies at columbia university’s teachers college, gets to deliver that line a lot. He is, after all, doing something pretty gutsy with his academic opus: completing the whole thing in comic book form. A quick glance at his dissertation unflattening: a visual verbal inquiry into learning in many dimensions makes clear that it’s a stark deviation from the traditional, oft expected monograph. Flip to one page, and you’ll find a series of intricately drawn eyeballs interspersed with a quote from mikhail bakhtin about our own monolithic and closed world. Turn to another, and you’ll see a rendering of a human face, slightly submerged in water, alongside several notes about the concept of immersion.

Text is powerful and useful, sousanis says, and it shouldn’t be thrown away because someone did something with comics. But why are we privileging one form over the others? it’s a question more and more academics are asking. As digital projects become more prevalent and as more scholars brainstorm ways to make graduate work user friendly and widely accessible, it’s clear that doctoral study is evolving. Sousanis’ work is just one example of this evolution, says sidonie smith, director of the institute for the humanities at university of michigan, who is a former president of the modern language association. Smith has also seen dissertations presented as series of articles, as public blogs, and as interactive digital projects, to name a few.

We had a system for long time where there were two modes of communication: the book and the article. We ask, ‘what is the best form for what i’m trying to get at here? for the intervention i want to make? for the shape of the project?’ that serves the people better. To some academics, alternative dissertations can seem innovative to others, they can seem unserious.

A comic book dissertation might sound fun, but preparing to defend the thing? that can make extra work for the author and the advisors, as sousanis can attest. a project of comic proportions sousanis’ relationship with comics has been a long one. He doodled as a child developed his first superhero comic, lockerman, in junior high and continued serializing that character’s adventures through the end of high school. But he didn’t get serious about the artform until after college, when he found himself running an arts and culture webzine in detroit. For one exhibition on games as art sousanis wrote an essay, in comic form, about the history and philosophy of gaming. It really demonstrated that i could reach a wide audience and still convey deep concepts. When he arrived at columbia, he shared the piece on games and suggested to his advisors that he could do the same type of work with a focus on education.

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The work is now in its final stages, and the medium is a huge part of the message. Sousanis argues that, by interweaving visual and textual elements, comics open up avenues for creating and learning that aren’t possible through writing alone. The dissertation comprises a series of chapters, each representing a different dimension of learning.

When discussing perception beyond the visual sense, for example, sousanis depicts his dog, sledge, navigating deep woods in the darkness. The dog uses many modes of perception to experience the world incredible hearing, night vision, a strong sense of smell, and an acute concept of time. In doing so, sousanis writes, the dog accesses dimensions of experience that humans can’t fathom. Rather than illustrating things, the images and the composition are the thinking.

My approach was ‘why not?’ then i realized part of the dissertation also had to be ‘why?’ i had to show why comics do what they do. I’m of a generation where ‘comic’ means superman, says robbie mcclintock, one of those advisors and an emeritus professor of the historical and philosophical foundations of education. The images that he’s constructing, his artwork, fits very well with the intentions of his dissertation. It’s one thing to sign off on the concept it’s another thing to shepherd it to a successful defense. Ruth vinz, sousanis’ primary advisor and the chair of the arts and humanities department, admits that she wasn’t initially sure how much help she’d be able to provide. In the early stages, advisor and student met regularly, and sousanis guided vinz through his frames.