Covid-19 comics as graphic networks of non-emergent healthcare: A multimodal discourse analysis of pandemic comics

COVID-19 comic discourses articulating lived experiences during lockdown, isolation, and quarantine constructed a creative space of self and collective care. This research article explores how the multimodality within COVID-19 comic discourses aids in constructing a ‘networked public of graphic care’. Resorting to Dannah Boyd’s (2008; 2011) methodological framework of ‘networks of graphic care,’ comics on the themes of self-care, coping mechanisms, and mental well-being from the work COVID Chronicles: A Comics Anthology (Boileau & Johnson, 2021) is analysed. A Multimodal Discourse Analysis (MDA) is performed to decipher the visual and verbal comic devices employed in constructing this graphic network of care using Thierry Groensteen (2007) and Scott McCloud's (2008) comic theories. The analysis highlights the various visual and linguistic techniques that enhance the communicative effectiveness of COVID-19 comics as self-care tools. By intervening in the visuality of COVID-19 comics as a tool of mental healthcare on individual and collective levels, this study illustrates the potential of comic narratives as a sustainable mode of sustenance and care in times of adversity and uncertainty. Furthermore, drawing from the results, the article also proposes the potentiality of comic discourses as non-emergent healthcare tools and a pedagogical tool for the successive policy implementation of mental healthcare measures.