INTERVIEW: ‘Indiginerds’ is a new comic anthology celebrating Indigenous culture
Image courtesy of Iron Circus Comics / Provided by Superfan Promotions with permission.
Iron Circus Comics found success in 2022 when they published the folklore-centered Woman in the Woods, the fifth volume in their Cautionary Fables & Fairytales series. One of the co-editors of that anthology, Alina Pete, is working again with the company on Indiginerds, a celebration of Indigenous culture that features nearly a dozen stories from Indigenous authors and artists.
The expansive project, which documents “modern Indigenous life,” has entered its final week of fundraising on BackerKit. Originally the project had a $20,000 goal, but preorders have already surpassed $31,000, as of press time.
Pete, a nehiyaw (Cree) artist and writer from Little Pine First Nation in western Saskatchewan, has said that this new anthology will expand the reader’s understanding of Indigenous culture and showcase all of the “nerdy” aspects of the lives depicted. They are also the author of one of the stories in Indiginerds: “Dorvan V.” Other storytellers include Ida Aronson, Tate Allen, Raven John, Kameron White and Wren Rios, among others.
Recently Hollywood Soapbox exchanged emails with Pete to talk about the project and what readers can expect. Questions and answers have been slightly edited for style.
How did the idea for this anthology come about? What did day one look like?
I got the idea for this anthology when chatting with my friend, James Willier (the author for the story “Saving Throws”), about our experiences growing up as Native nerds. We’d both been drawn to fantasy and sci-fi from a young age, but had also picked up on a lot of the colonial tropes inherent in the genres and didn’t feel represented by them. We also didn’t know a lot of other Indigenous people within our fan communities and were happy to find one another.
I realized that not only did we as Indigenous people need a place to share these stories with each other, but we could also talk about how pop culture hits differently when you’re Indigenous.
How did you assemble all of these talented writers and artists?
We put out a Call for Submissions through the Iron Circus website and invited Indigenous people from around the world to submit their story ideas. Some people pitched together as artist/writer teams, but others pitched solo. If I liked the story they pitched, I would match them up with an artist whose style fit the story, and when possible, who was from a similar region as they were, so any cultural-specific art styles or references would be compatible.
Were there any parameters on what type of story you were looking for?
Not many! I was looking to represent the diversity of the Indigenous experience in this anthology, so I didn’t want to put too many limits on the pitches. Indiginerds features fiction right alongside autobiographical stories — the main thing I was looking for was the voice and experiences represented in the stories were authentically Indigenous, and that they featured modern culture or technology in some way.
Are these stories being published for the first time, or have they appeared elsewhere first?
These stories are all exclusive to Indiginerds, and honestly, you’re not going to find stories like these anywhere else. That’s what makes this anthology so special.
Do you hope that Indiginerds offers a different, more accurate representation of Indigenous culture?
Absolutely. That was one of the goals of this anthology — not only to provide a platform for the comics industry to discover the amazing wealth of Indigenous talent that is out there, but also as a way for non-Indigenous people to learn more about our lives as fully modern people. A lot of public perception around Indigenous folks places us in the past, but we’re right here alongside the rest of you, playing the same video games and arguing about which movies we love the most!
Could you describe your day-to-day as an editor for a project like this? What do your responsibilities entail?
I’ve worn a lot of different hats for this project. It started when I wrote up a formal proposal for the project and ran it by Iron Circus. They loved the idea, and since then I’ve been coordinating artist/writer teams, sending updates to make sure all the stories are on target for their deadlines, and even lending a hand with converting prose writing to comic script formatting. It’s been a very busy year and a half, but I’m so excited to share the final product with everyone!
When did you first fall in love with comics?
At the library, while my mom was doing her bachelor’s degree. While she was studying, I had free rein of the library, and more often than not, you’d find me flipping through the Chickadee Magazine, reading the comics or drawing the different animal species inside. I’d also steal the comics page of the newspaper, and by age 7, I could draw a pretty good Garfield, which I doodled on most of my exam papers. My love of manga and cape comics came later, in high school, but it was those early comics that really left a lasting impression on me.
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
Indiginerds, edited by Alina Pete and published by Iron Circus Comics, is currently fundraising via BackerKit. Click here for more information.
