Towards an Alternative Aesthetics of the Graphic Form: Notes from Graphic Narratives in India

This paper explores the theorization of the "popular" within cultural and literary studies, particularly through the lens of graphic novels. While Western scholarship, rooted in thinkers like Pierre Bourdieu, has stratified cultural forms based on taste and class distinctions, such frameworks often inadequately capture the complexities of popular culture in postcolonial contexts such as India. Drawing upon foundational and contemporary theoretical works from cultural theory, postcolonial studies, and comic studies, this paper critiques the wholesale application of Western notions of the "popular" to Indian graphic novels. Instead, it proposes an alternative framework- Hans Harder's "vernatuclar"- that accounts for India’s unique socio-cultural, linguistic, and political landscape. This reconfiguration not only challenges the global hegemony in popular culture theory but also positions the Indian graphic novel as a dynamic site for negotiating taste, class, and urban capitalist modernity.