ABSTRACT
Damian Duffy and John Jennings’s 2017 graphic novel adaptation of Kindred, Octavia Butler’s classic neo-slave narrative originally published in 1979, invites readers to empathize with the protagonist Dana’s plight through a variety of visual styling and graphic narrative techniques. The graphic novel further enhances the interrogation of gender, race, and historical master narratives already present in Kindred and rewrites the traditional slave narrative through the protagonist Dana’s travels from 1976 Los Angeles to the ante-bellum South where she is forced to perform the role of house slave at the Weylin plantation. Informed by narrative and cognitive theory, this chapter illustrates how readers in graphic narratives can have embodied experiences that operate in the service of social justice issues.
