Jeff Hemmer & Rowena Seabrook - Comics in Human Rights Education - Amnesty International's Approach

Abstract

Amnesty International has a long-standing tradition of cooperating with artists from different fields to promote human rights and raise awareness about human rights abuses. In recent years, besides endorsing selected graphic novels relevant to Amnesty's causes, the NGO has come to devise and publish comics of its own. These comics are used very effectively for educational as well as campaign work. Amnesty uses a wide range of genres and narrative approaches to deliver its messages and reach out to different audiences. The reading materials for this group will include a sample of comics developed by various sections of the international organisation. For its #SendBackUp campaign, Amnesty UK teamed up with Marvel and DC artist Neil Edwards to present 'The Human Rights Defenders', a series of short superhero comics about ordinary people doing extraordinary things. Amnesty Sri Lanka's 'Spectrum: Four Stories of Discrimination Faced by LGBTI People in Sri Lanka' uses a biographical approach to engage its readers. Amnesty Germany's wordless educational comic 'Who defends human rights?' relies on a simple colour code and multiple converging storylines to transcend language barriers and speak to anyone able to read a sequence of pictures.