Rider University Professor Pens Comic Book About Superhero With Down Syndrome

LAWRENCEVILLE, NJ — A Rider University professor who has written extensively about race is tackling a new topic in the latest comic book series from publisher Catalyst Prime.

Sheena Howard is the co-writer on “Superb,” a comic book about a superhero with Down Syndrome that hit comic book stores last week. Howard, an Associate Professor of Communication at Rider, was the first black woman to win an Eisner Award, for her book “Black Comics: Politics of Race and Representation.”

“Superb” co-stars a black teenage girl named Kayla who was friends with the main character, and moved away before a cataclysmic event that gave certain people super powers and made the others scared of them. When a person is found to have enhanced abilities, they are taken away.

“The cool thing about writing comics is that they are polysemic,” Howard said in an interview that appears in the back of the first issue. “You can work implicit meaning into the storyline. So it is a challenge and a goal to provide subtext and shared cultural meaning, to incorporate social justice work throughout the storyline.”

In the first issue, Kayla stands up for her friend, Jonah, against bullies who are picking on him. Later in the comic, the reader learns that Jonah is a superhero who can silence people and paralyze them by shooting lasers out of his eyes.

Howard told Newsworks.org that she gave him the power to silence people because someone who is always being picked on would naturally want to silence their bullies. Howard, who co-writes the series with David Walker, said the stories will reflect real life issues, and that she’s willing to write the series as long as there’s an audience for it.

The second issue is scheduled to come out on Wednesday, Aug. 16, according to atomicempire.com.

Photo Credit: Anthony Bellano