Jennifer Stuller, author of Ink Stained Amazons, is one of the coolest people (if not the coolest person) I’ve met in 2010.
I was first turned onto her book (a critical historical analysis of women super heroes in popular culture) by a writer for my website, Geek Girl on the Street, after she saw Jennifer speak on a panel at Wondercon earlier this year.
Forging a friendship together via Facebook and Twitter (on which Jennifer states “You have to give me lessons, okay?”) San Diego Comic Con was the first time we’ve ever met face to face. Truly it was an exciting moment for me and we’ve spent a bunch of time getting to know each other IRL over this crazy weekend. This morning I sat down with Jen at a coffee shop near the convention hall and we discussed what the highlights of the weekend were:
Hey Girly Geekdom readers! I’m here at San Diego Comic Con International chatting with Ink Stained Amazons author, Jennifer Stuller. So I’ve been hanging out with Jennifer all weekend and she’s my new geeky soul-sister. I suspect that our London (UK) geek-sisters weren’t able to make it out here the year that [geek girls] took over Comic Con. So, Jen I think maybe we should talk about the highlights of our experience here, so our friends across the pond can share vicariously with us. Do you want to start?
One of the things that I’ve always really, really loved and that I’m seeing in full force here this year is women coming together in celebration of the things they love and in celebration of each other. And, we’re seeing a real sense of sisterhood here [in San Diego], which is kind of like a corny word, yanno? But, the concept behind it is really cool.
I think that’s a really important thing to note, because I’ve talked to a lot of women in tech in my professional life who have talked about how women [in tech] can be kind of back stabby. Instead of getting together to work together, they can be back stabby. I think that it’s an important point to make, we’re talking about sisterhood here, everyone has been so warm and open and lovely…
I think that it is that we’re not fighting, necessarily, in a male dominated career space. These women, and I admire them and want to learn from them, a lot of young women who are doing this [pop culture stuff] who are using social networking techniques to build their brand, build their connections, build their career and then take over these spaces. They’re not having to fight from within them, where you end up being kind of back stabby by nature, nothing against the other girls, but it’s fighting for survival.
I think that’s a really good point, too. One of the things I’ve loved the most is meeting — the people I talk to on Facebook, or read their blogs or Tweet at — because, I usually only use Twitter to get my own brand out into the world… But, when I take the time to have a direct message conversation with someone, I feel like I get to know people. It’s so refreshing to me to put names and Twitter handles and blogs to faces and feel like I’ve cemented that friendship.
My Dad actually convinced me to get on Facebook and I was like “Dad, that’s so weird!” Yet, I’ve connected with all of these people, I’ve made friends… I met you by Googling myself and someone had mentioned me on your site from Wondercon, and we became friends.
Yes, yay!
When you think about it, it seems really strange getting to know people through Twitter and Facebook and blogs. And, you don’t really see each other face to face, you almost have this secret identities “Ink Stained Amazon,” “Nerdy Bird,” “Action Chick”. If you go back to the early comic cons, you have the same thing letter columns in science fiction magazines or comic books or…
Or, BBCs… yeah!
So I think it’s a neat evolution.
BBC… duh, BBSes. That was my nerd faux pas of the day, I hope I won’t have any more.
I think it’s a neat evolution of that, it’s on a much bigger scale and with new forms of communication.
All weekend, besides me, who is the person you were the most excited to meet?
I was pretty excited to meet Clara Kramer yesterday, she was so kind and so nice. I was pretty excited, I was sitting here at the coffee shop and I saw these two women walking and there was this totally gorgeous woman. And, I was like “who is this totally gorgeous woman, she looks totally familiar.” I was like “Oh my god, it’s Marti Noxon!” (ed note: Marti Noxon is one of the producers of Buffy the Vampire Slayer) I was on the phone with my Dad and I was like “Gotta go!” I jumped out of my seat and like a big shameless nerd, I introduced myself to her… that was really cool. That’s the kind of thing that happens at Comic Con, all the sudden you’re sitting next to a comic book writer or an actress, there is a really comfortable sense of community.
I think that the person I was most excited to meet, besides you, was Debbie Myers, the president of the Science Channel. I was like “oh my god, you’re so cool!” I’m going to interview her for the Geek of the Week spot on my website. Everyone has been so cool… I was also excited to meet Kylee Lane, she does the geek soaps, the Fight Club, the Han Solo in Carbonite…
Oh is she the one in Spokane, Washington?
No, she’s in Iowa.
There is a girl in Spokane who does video game controllers in soap.
Oh yeah, I saw her on Etsy. Then at the Geek Girls and Friends Tweet-up last night I won a Han Solo in Carbonite soap for answering a Doctor Who trivia question. I was so psyched!
You have to post a picture of it!
I will, I have too much stuff to post, people are telling me “post your pictures, Kate!” And, I’m like “I’m too bizzay!” What are the highlights of comic con for you? I know you did two panels yesterday…
I did one panel yesterday and then I went and sat in on a panel called Girls Gone Genre.
I’m lovin’ all the geek girl content. And, that’s a lot.
That’s a lot compared to last year. There was none, women were so margenalized and then we were included in the LGBT programming. Not that I mind at all being included in the LGBT programming, that’s a huge component of our community and it’s great. But, women were included in those panels because that was the only place [the con organizers] thought we could fit. Though there were more spotlights last year. Last year we had Hope Larson and Gail Simone and a bunch of other women who were spotlighted last year.
Have you checked who won the Eisners yet?
No, I haven’t.
Trina Robbins was nominated for The Brinkley Girls, I wonder if she won.
What’s the best piece of schwag you got?
That’s a hard question. I think my Scott Pilgrim shirt was pretty cute. The best thing was that I got a poster signed by Brendan Ross and Mae Whitman, because Mae Whitman is just so awesome and I hope she gets more roles.
I got a poster signed by all the Mythbusters, I got an Adam Baldwin as Jayne in Firefly lithograph, I got a Han Solo in Carbonite soap and I really love the Black Phoenix Alchmey Labs gift bags from the Geek Girls and Friends Tweet-up last night!
I like it, too! Except that I thought it was pretty funny that they gave us a bunch of liquids and I hope that everyone remembers…
To check them?
Or, to put them in their quart bag. Because you know you’re going to be so sad when you’re going home and your Neil Gaiman perfume gets thrown out.
Oh that perfume is so funny! Everyone was like “What? Neil Gaiman doesn’t need a perfume!!” And, I was like “No that’s exactly why he has one, though!” I interviewed him in Chicago and he was so sweet. Then when I got home his merch manager sent me a thank you package for the interview. How cool is that? Like I should be saying thank you to Neil Gaiman, not the other way around! Okay: the biggest geek out moment you’ve had with a celebrity?
I don’t know, introducing myself to Greg Rucka and thanking him for writing such amazing women, that was a pretty big geek out moment.
I don’t know what my biggest geek out moment is. Have I had a geek out moment yet? Inside I was geeking out over Eugene Mirmen and Kristin Schaal, mostly because I think that Kristin is a great example of a geeky woman in mainstream media. Ray says I’m very reserved. He totally geeked out over Kari Byron yesterday, which I thought was totally cute. And, Eugene Mirmen. Ray is our photographer, London geek girls, in case you don’t know that. He’s been following us around all weekend taking awesome pictures.
He’s doing a great job.
What is the best professional moment you’ve had here this weekend?
Actually being able to say something smart and entertaining and that got laughs in the 13 minutes I had to speak on the panel I was on. I spoke in front of the largest crowd I’ve ever spoken in front of.
Were you nervous?
I was totally nervous, I was up all the night before and I thought I was going to throw up. But, then I got up on the stage and I get that first laugh, then I’m cool – I can do the performance and get through it. People kept coming up to me and saying “Can I buy your book at the convention?” So I tried to sign promotional postcards for them, because they’re not for sale here.
They should be! Jennifer is the author of Ink Stained Amazons. Us geek girls we’re all into feminist studies, we all had the women’s studies minor in college and anyone who is into comic books should read her book.
Or TV or film.
Yes, there’s a lot of Buffy in there, too.
So that’s my best professional moment.
I think that my best professional moment was introducing myself to Debbie Myers and asking her if I could interview her for my site. And, also, meeting the geek blogger for the Chicago Tribune – as Chicago is where I’m about to move – he said he’d sit down with me and I could pick his brain about pitching geek stories in Chicago.
That’s awesome!
Yeah I thought that was really awesome.
I have a friend in Chicago, she’s in her early 20s and she’s a burgeoning film critic and I totally want to introduce you two to each other.
Oh totally! Oh, yes and I’m going to interview Kristy Guevara-Flanagan next week, because she’s in San Francisco and I really want to talk to her about her Wonder Woman documentary!
She’s in Oakland, like you! We went out to dinner last night. At the restaurant they had seating so we thought that it would be good. All we wanted was to get a drink and then they were like “We lost our liquor license.”
Oh no!
That’s why when we got to the Geek Girl Tweet-up we were so over it.
The Tweet-up was really great, except it was hard to get a drink. Are you going to go to the Celebrate the Web stuff this afternoon?
No, I’m being interviewed for the Comic Con documentary -A Fan’s Hope- the documentary that Morgan Spurlock is doing. Then after that: all weekend I’ve avoided standing in lines for things, I would have loved to go to the True Blood panel, I would have loved to go to the J.J. Abrams/Joss Whedon panel… there’s so many things going on I think it’s a waste of time to stand in line for hours and miss things, especially for things that will be posted online, anyway. But, I need to get into the Nikkita panel this afternoon. I need to write about it. Then I want to go to the SmartPop party.
Oh, maybe we’ll try to meet you there! The thing that you guys reading need to know is that Comic Con isn’t just about panels and the schwag, it’s about the opportunity for free booze and to rub elbows with people far more famous than yourself. So we’re going to Celebrate the Web because I got the inside scoop perhaps there might be someone from Dr. Horrible’s Sing-a-long Blog there. Then our friend Ethan (Kaye) introduced us to the editors from Topless Robot and they invited us to the Topless Robot party.
Was he the really excited blond?
Yes, that was Ethan — he writes for Wizard, Topless Robot and now for BleedingCool!
Which is awesome!
Let’s talk a little bit about your book, because we should… I hate to say I haven’t read it yet. I’ve skimmed through it, though and I think it’s a really smart, critical look at the roles of women in pop culture. I just kind of wondered how did you get put on the path to become a comic scholar? You’re actually the first person in this field I’ve ever met. I’ve heard of geek scholars, there’s a whole slew of women in tech who are geek scholars, but I’ve never met a comic book scholar.
That’s so funny! I could be called a comic scholar, I could be called a pop culture historian or a feminist pop culture historian. The comic scholar thing, I started this whole process I was very much into TV, which as we were discussing in the panel yesterday is kind of traditionally been seen as a women’s media. Because women are keepers of the home, so commercials and television are geared towards women. As opposed to film or comic books, which are geared towards…
Dudes.
Dudes. So I began thinking what I really wanted to study was the role of women in popular culture. And, I began looking at women in comics and film, as well as women on television. I tried video games, too, but even though my husband works in the industry I just couldn’t get into them. I read the book by Trina Robbins, The Great Women Superheroes, which was great and amazing. Then I went to a conference in Australia called the “Holy Men in Tights Conference”. I met Pete Coogan who was one of the founders of the Comic Arts Conference and Randy Duncan, also co-founded that conference. But, Pete was there and he had just recently been at a conference with my mentor – so I was able to go up to him and introduce myself – that night, utelizing the shameless networking skills, I managed to get myself invited out to dinner with all the keynote speakers and the organizers of the conference. So I kept in touch with Pete and proposed a paper for the Comic Arts Conference. And, I’ve been speaking here or at Wondercon every year since then as a comic scholar. While I couldn’t tell you everything about the history of comics, because that’s insane, there are things I like to look at different arcs, different characters over different eras to see what we can learn about popular culture at that time. Like Lois Lane in the 60s. What does that say about gender in the 60s? What are male writers equating feminism with through comics?
I wanted the book to be really accessible.
And, it is. I started reading it before I left and the thing I noted a lot of times – like I said, most geek girls have some sort of feminist/women’s studies background – it just seems to be, that at least women of our age, in our mid-30s, we came of age in a time when that was a really popular choice. And a good one, I think that studying those things really broadens your mind to think about life outside your own little box. But, when you read a book, even if it’s on popular culture, if it’s designed for gender studies, sometimes it’s really tough. Because it’s got a lot of jargon and a lot academic talk. Thankfully I speak academic because both my parents are academics — incidentally, if you’re the child of a teacher or a professor and you’re reading this — if you haven’t gotten to college yet, take comfort in the fact that once you do you’ll kick some serious ass. But, the book is really accessible, it’s written in a really familiar tone of voice, in a really open way and I think that with the right networking and marketing that Ink Stained Amazons will become as big a success in popular culture as it is in academia.
Aw… thank you. I hope so, I really really hope so.
So the question that I ask everyone that I interview, do you have any piece of truly salient advice that you’d give to young women who want to grow up and do what you do, professionally?
I say be persistent, be polite, know your passions, work really hard and just put yourself out there. You’ll never know who you’re going to talk to.
[Photos by Rason Sampson]
About Kate Kotler
Kate is a self-proclaimed “Doctor Who expert,” and thinks the most romantic gift she ever got was a copy of the Complete Star Wars Encyclopedia. Her most prized possession is a stuffed animal her uncle Mike gave her when she was four.
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