Guillaume de Syon

Dr Guillaume de Syon

Albright College, History Department

Editorial advisory board member, Journal of Popular Culture

Popular Culture Association; American Historical Association; Society for the History of Technology

Contact Details

Email: guillaume.desyon@fandm.edu, gdesyon@alb.edu

Postal address: History Dept., Albright College, 1621 N 13^th street, Reading, PA 19612-5234, USA

Telephone: 610 921 7822

Website: http://faculty.albright.edu/history/gdesyon.html (university staff page)

Biography and Research Interests

I trained as a specialist of modern Germany, but have branched out to include history of technology and the perceptions of machinery, especially aviation, in popular culture (postcards, comics, etc….).

Research interests: cultural history of aviation, comics and history, Europe in the World Wars

Publications

“Did You Learn Your Strip: The History of France as Comic Fad in the 1970s” in Annessa babic, ed. Comics as History, Comics as Literature: Roles of the Comic Book in Scholarship, Society, and Entertainment (Rowman and Littlefield, Forthcoming.)

“Between Balloon and Moon: Visions of Space Travel in Francophone Comic Strips,” in Alexander C. T. Geppert, ed. Astrofuturism. New York, NY: Palgrave, 2012.

“Yes, One may caricature God.” French Secular Culture and the Limits of Cartooning,” in Bernhard Debatin, ed., The Cartoon Debate and the Freedom of the Press:Conflicting Norms and Values in the Global Media Culture // Der Karikaturenstreit und die Pressefreiheit:Wert- und Normenkonflikte in der globalen Medienkultur. Muenster, germany: LIT verlag, 2007. http://www.caricaturesetcaricature.com/article-14096996.html

“Don’t read those ‘toons! French Comics, Government Censorship, and Perceptions of American Military Aviation,” in Contemporary French Civilization 28, 2 (2004): 274-292. http://www.caricaturesetcaricature.com/article-14096996.html

Conference Papers and Talks

“Between the Bubble and the Moon: Visions of Space Travel in Francophone Comic Strips,” at the “Imagining Outer Space 1900-2000” international conference, Zentrum für interdisziplinäre Forschung, University of Bielefeld, Germany, February 8, 2008.

“The Pilot in the Comic Book: French Perceptions of Military Aviation in Popular Literature, 1950-1990.” Presentation at the “Images of Military Flight in Movies and Comic Books” panel of the International Symposium on the History of Flight, Raleigh, NC, October 23, 2001.

“Pilots, Comics, and Sociopolitics: The Peculiarities of a French Perception.” Presentation in the Comic Art area of the annual Popular Culture Association (PCA) meeting, Philadelphia, PA, April 15, 1995.