Abstract
In 2014, Marvel comics introduced a new character to take over the mantle of the superhero identity Ms. Marvel. The new heroine is Kamala Khan, a 16-year-old girl born and raised in New Jersey. Khan is Marvel’s first Pakistani-American, Muslim superhero to headline her own comic book; as such, she represents a move towards diversification in a historically conservative, white and masculine genre. In addition, Kamala Khan comes into existence in a political and social context where the 9/11 attacks, the ‘War on Terror’, and Islamophobia continue to reverberate. This article explores how the Ms. Marvel comic functions as a critique of the ways in which social norms, stereotypes and prejudices have monsterized multicultural, Muslim identities, especially in the years following 9/11. Conducting analyses of Khan’s conflicted relationship to her own identities and issues concerning visibility and concealment, I explore how these negative framings affect her self-perception, and in turn her self-representation. Lastly, I aim to illustrate the ways in which the comic challenges monolithic and monstrous representations of Islam through its depiction of diverse, multicultural, Muslim identities.
Highlights
For a long time, comics were regarded by the academic field as a mass-produced form of easy entertainment
In volume five of Ms Marvel, the Khan parents Muneeba and Yusuf display a somewhat limited acceptance of difference upon first hearing the news that Kamala’s brother Aamir plans to marry Tyesha (Wilson et al 2016). She is an African-American woman raised by Christian parents, but she decided to convert to Islam at some point before readers meet her
As with many superhero comic books before it, Ms Marvel is to a large degree about standing out, about being different—about being, as the first volume title emphasizes, ‘no normal’
Summary
Comics were regarded by the academic field as a mass-produced form of easy entertainment. The creation of a monstrous Other may be seen in relation to war-time acts of constructing an image of ‘the enemy’ This was the case for several of the earliest superhero comics, as the genre was closely intertwined with world war two propaganda (Duncan/Smith 2009; Scott 2007). This era produced the Nazi villain Red Skull (a man who literally looks like the flesh has been burned from his body), who remains a presence in Marvel comics and films to this day.5 Such superhero comic book portrayals of US enemies illustrate Cohen’s concept of the monstrous Other and the matrix of categories (political, racial, cultural) that can intersect in the creation of “monstrous difference” (7). In the wake of the 9/11 attacks, ‘Muslims’ and ‘Arabs’ were visible as media coverage surged in US and
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