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The Invisible Enemy Within: Depicting Communist Women in an American Cold-War Comic Book
Maxwell, Alexander
2026
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e-ISSN
3103-8247
Abstract
This essay examines the depiction of women in the comic book This Godless Communism, a heavily didactic piece of Cold War propaganda drawn for Catholic children by the artist Reed Crandall. The comic depicts good American women, West European women, East European peasant women, and Communist women. Different women play different roles in the story. Despite ubiquitous stereotypes in Crandall’s other work, in comic books as a genre, and in American society generally, Crandall drew Communist women and good American women the same. This striking choice furthers the narrative by emphasizing the danger of the internal enemy who is visually indistinguishable and thus difficult to detect.
Publisher
EUT Edizioni Università di Trieste
Source
Alexander Maxwell, "The Invisible Enemy Within: Depicting Communist Women in an American Cold-War Comic Book" in: "Qualestoria. Rivista di storia contemporanea. LIV, N.ro 1, Giugno 2026", EUT Edizioni Università di Trieste, Trieste, 2026, pp. 7-25
Languages
en
Rights
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
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