New Journal and CFP: Journal of Comics and Graphic Novels

Today I received word of yet another forthcoming academic journal devoted to comics scholarship. This time it's Journal of Comics and Graphic Novels, from Routledge. As always, you can find a complete list of journals related to comics scholarship at the Academic page of ComicsResearch.org.
Here's how the journal is described at its website:

The Journal of Graphic Novels and Comics is a peer reviewed journal covering all aspects of the graphic novel, comic strip and comic book, with the emphasis on comics in their cultural, institutional and creative contexts. Its scope is interdisciplinary and international, covering not only English language comics but also worldwide comic culture. The journal reflects interdisciplinary research in comics and aims to establish a dialogue between academics, historians, theoreticians and practitioners of comics. It therefore examines comics production and consumption within the contexts of culture: art, cinema, television and new media technologies.

The journal will include all forms of 'sequential imagery' including precursors of the comic but in the main emphasis will be on twentieth and twenty-first century examples, reflecting the increasing interest in the modern forms of the comic, its production and cultural consumption.

The general Call for Papers is available as a PDF, but here's the gist:

Contributions are invited on a wide range of comic-related topics including, but not limited to:

Genres (horror, romance, superheroes, experimental, autobiographical etc), underground/alternative comics, censorship, online comics, political and topical issues, fans and audiences (subcultures, gender, subcultural production), comics production and distribution systems, representing famous people in comics (American Presidents, sports heroes, film stars, iconic figures from history).

Possible topics for future themed issues include: Gender issues (comics as male dominated institutions, creators, audiences, representations, women fans, women creators in small press comics), individual genres (horror, romance, superheroes etc), adaptations, convergence culture, key creators (Moore, Hergé, Ware, Crumb, Eisner, McCay, Herriman etc) and national comic cultures (Manga, Latin America, Bande Dessineé etc).

Articles between 5000-7000 words should be emailed to: David Huxley (D.Huxley@mmu.ac.uk) and Joan Ormrod (J.Ormrod@mmu.ac.uk) or posted to: Faculty of Art & Design, Manchester Metropolitan University, Chatham Building, Cavendish Street, Manchester, M15 6BR, UK

I'll be curious to see how these new journals will differentiate themselves from others in the field once they begin publication...