ChinaComx Postdoctoral researcher, Damian Mandzunowski, will present a paper at the upcoming AAS Annual Conference 2026 in Vancouver, Canada, on Saturday, 14 March 2026, at 10:30 AM - 12:00 PM PDT in the VCC, Room 21.

Titled “A Gallery of Villains: Standardizing Images of Enmity in Chinese Socialist Comics (Lianhuanhua),” his paper traces the evolution and political uses of villains in new socialist comics from the 1950s to the 1970s.

Paper abstract:

As an organization of civil war fighters transformed into managers of a modern state, the question of who was “with us” and who was “against us” motivated the Chinese Communist Party during the initial years of the People’s Republic of China. Recent scholarship frames this Schmittian fixation on antagonism as the very essence of a Maoist political. It also corresponded to a political culture that was also intensely visual, ranging from posters, photography, and films to cartoons and comic books (lianhuanhua). This paper offers a novel analysis of how lianhuanhua served as a critical tool for codifying and disseminating the visual vocabulary of socialist enmity. Drawing on artists’ debates, drawing manuals, and internal reference books from the 1950s-1970s, I trace the development of a formalistic template for depicting “bad people”: class enemies, traitors, counterrevolutionaries, and other political adversaries. Applied and reused in scores of lianhuanhua, the comics provided concrete, recognizable narratives for a mass audience that ranged from children and the semi-literate to young workers and mothers. The medium’s role was often explicit, with comics commissioned to vilify targeted groups during political purges or to provide exemplary negative illustrations to new laws. By comparing exemplary lianhuanhua with their underlying blueprints and political instructions, this paper ultimately argues that the visual templates were a key instrument of social engineering, creating a powerful and easily understood iconography of deviance to enforce political conformity across China. By doing so, the gallery of villains aided the creation of a new socialist subject.

Damian’s paper is part of a panel he co-organized. Titled “‘Bad’ People in the People’s Republic of China: Criminals, Enemies, and Villains under Mao,” in addition to Damian, the panel consists of co-organizer Puck Engman (University of California, Berkeley), Haiyan Lee (Stanford University) as Chair, Aminda Smith (Michigan State University), Wenqing Kang (Cleveland State University), and Yiwen Yvon Wang (University of Toronto) as Discussant.

Panel abstract:

This panel examines the “bad people” of the early People’s Republic of China (1949-76). In this category were those finding themselves on the wrong side of the law, moral sensibilities, or in opposition to the Chinese Communist Party, revolution, and socialism. The question of who belonged here depended on constantly shifting boundaries between “good” people and “bad.” Legal experts debated whether all crimes stemmed from antagonistic contradictions “between us and them” or whether all criminals were class enemies. Consecutive mass campaigns redefined transgression and reshaped the image of the enemy. A scarcity of codified law blurred distinctions between minor misdeeds and major crimes, and in a revolutionary society aiming for the transformation of every person, the line between education and punishment was thin. The papers of this panel explore the political construction and lived experiences of various “bad people.” Puck Engman provides new estimates of China’s incarcerated population between 1949 and 1976 and discusses the implications for a new history of punishment. Wenqing Kang analyzes the criminalization of lifestyles through the case of male same-sex relations. Damian Mandzunowski unpacks the political and conceptual blueprints used to depict and identify villains in popular visual culture. Aminda Smith considers the unexpected trajectories of nationally celebrated labor models when they fell afoul of the party. As discussant, Yvon Wang will draw on his work on the history of deviance and everyday life. Haiyan Lee, who has written extensively on the legal culture and moral imagination of the PRC, will act as chair.