Class Consciousness in Kate Beaton’s Ducks
Start Date
16-3-2024 3:45 PM
End Date
16-3-2024 4:30 PM
Description
In her 2022 graphic novel Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands, Kate Beaton recounts her experience working in the Canadian oil industry to pay off her student loans. Unlike many contemporary graphic memoirs (or memoirs in general), Beaton places her personal story in the broader economic context that produced it. Beaton presents the harshness and alienation of her work conditions as indivisible from class; she also presents her fraught experience in a male-majority work environment as defined by her own gender. How does Beaton’s focus on class impact her focus on gender throughout her story, and vice versa?
Class Consciousness in Kate Beaton’s Ducks
In her 2022 graphic novel Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands, Kate Beaton recounts her experience working in the Canadian oil industry to pay off her student loans. Unlike many contemporary graphic memoirs (or memoirs in general), Beaton places her personal story in the broader economic context that produced it. Beaton presents the harshness and alienation of her work conditions as indivisible from class; she also presents her fraught experience in a male-majority work environment as defined by her own gender. How does Beaton’s focus on class impact her focus on gender throughout her story, and vice versa?