Windward CC vice chancellor publishes Victorian studies paper

“Boys’ Adventure Magazines and the Discourse of Adventure, 1860-1885,”

Windward Community College
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Posted: Feb 3, 2011

Windward CC Vice Chancellor of Academic Affairs Richard Fulton (photo by Peter Owen)
Windward CC Vice Chancellor of Academic Affairs Richard Fulton (photo by Peter Owen)

 

Dr. Richard Fulton, vice chancellor of academic affairs at Windward Community College, recently published a paper entitled, “Boys’ Adventure Magazines and the Discourse of Adventure, 1860-1885,” in the latest issue of the Australasian Journal of Victorian Studies (Vol 15, No 1, 2010).
 
Fulton read earlier versions of the paper at conferences at Yale in September 2010 and in Honolulu in October 2010 at a conference that he helped organize, "Oceania and the East in the Victorian Imagination," the 15th Annual Conference of the Victorian Interdisciplinary Studies Association of the Western United States (VISAWUS). An earlier version of the paper was also read at the Research Society for Victorian Periodicals’ meeting at Roehampton University (London) in 2008.
 
In the paper, Fulton states the rise in popularity of boys’ adventure magazines in the period 1860-1885 could be attributed in part to their common discourse that included a rhetoric that emphasized sensational actions, simple good/evil characters and situations, simple language, colorful slang, jargon, and recurring metaphors (especially sporting and military metaphors) to emphasize action and excitement. The paper examines discourse in all elements of the magazines, from advertising to images to articles and stories, and speculates on the role of magazines in spreading these values in popular culture.
 
Fulton’s paper can be found online at www.nla.gov.au/openpublish/index.php/ajvs.