Past Panels
Title: Cultural and Identity Representations in Chinese Animations
Host: Dr. Huanshu Yuan
Description: This presentation reviews and discusses cultural and identity representations and validations through Chinese animations and fan fictions in this era of globalization. Through the review of selected popular Chinese animations, this session creates interactive dialogues and conversations on the reconstruction of cultural heritages and representations in Chinese pop culture.
Title: Whenever you want!
Host: Katwoman Cosplay
Description: A cosplay panel detailing the history, construction process, and community of cosplay!
Title: Dungeons, Dragons, & Everything Else: Worldbuilding 101
Host: Kallel Peterson
Description: When we construct our own settings for D&D, we get to decide the rules of the world. How do things like the economy work? What is the history of the place? What does the social structure look like? We engage with worldbuilding before a campaign, story arc, or session even starts. It’s how we answer player questions and make the setting feel alive. When we build worlds together, it increases player engagement and helps provide stakes for their characters. In this panel we’ll look at worldbuilding, briefly seeing what academics say about constructing fictional worlds—but also looking at strategies you can use for building or expanding your settings using a local game as an example.
Title: Chain Saw Man
Host: Ash Cosplays
Description: Be a part of the discussion… Ash Cosplays will be cosplaying Chain Saw Man and doing Q&A and activities in character.
Title: Between the Covers
Host: Join Henlo Press authors… Stephen Bias, Amanda Hooser, and Caitlyn Pace for discussion of their current projects, some off beat but friendly name calling and more.
Description: Stephen Bias, Amanda Hooser, & Caitlyn Pace
Title: “You’re Not Alone”: David Bowie, Gregg Allman, and the Music of Life’s End
Host: Dr. Margaret Sullivan & Nathan Rucker
Description: This panel looks at two iconic rock musicians—David Bowie and Gregg Allman—and their last albums: Bowie’s Blackstar and Allman’s Southern Blood. Both works, composed as the artists knew they were dying, demonstrate a conscious attempt to shape their own legacy. For Bowie, that means returning to the many “selves” he presented on former works (Ziggy Stardust, for instance, as well as Major Tom), while for Allman it means looking to artists who preceded him (among them are the Grateful Dead, Warren Zevon, and his brother Duane). We’ll talk about those musical choices, and also invite shared responses regarding what larger conclusions we might draw about music, meaning, and the passing of our cultural icons.
Title: The Saga of Elric of Melniboné – The Albino “anti-Conan” Character of Sword & Sorcery Fiction
Host: Bill Bissett
Description: A discussion of the more than six-decade journey of Elric of Melniboné, the albino sorcerer king who serves as the “anti-Conan” of sword & sorcery fiction. Written primarily by the character’s creator, Michael Moorcock, Elric’s saga takes him through different dimensions of a Multiverse and eventually includes him as one of the characters in Moorcock’s “Eternal Champion” pantheon. One NPR review describes Elric as “far and away the coolest, grimmest, moodiest, most elegant, degenerate, drug-addicted, cursed, twisted and emotionally weird mass murderer of them all.” The character has been featured in short story collections, standalone novels, comic books, rock music, roleplaying games, as well as failed attempts at a video game and film. This presentation will also explore the author as Moorcock, a self-described anarchist, is a controversial figure within his genre and quick to write caustic essays about popular fantasy authors like Tolkien, Lewis and Lovecraft.
Title: Reel Opposites Live at Herdcon
Host: Aaron Harper, Tobey Ferris, Heather Lauer, and Michelle Alford
Description: Join the team of the Reel Opposites Podcast and members of our HerdCon PopCast for a discussion of the film, Tucker & Dale Vs Evil
Title: Writing for Comics!
Host: Wesley Gift
Description: Have you ever wanted to explore writing and creating your own comic book? In this panel we will break down the process of creating your story, writing in the comic style format, and tips on collaborating with an artist to bring your story to life!
Title: Herdcon Book Chats Podcast discuss Trashlands by Alison Stine
Host: Dr. Cody Lumpkin and Meghan Sexton-Harness
Description: Book Chats with co-hosts Meghan Sexton-Harness and Dr. Cody Lumpkin will record a live podcast of their discussion of Trashlands by Ohio author Alison Stine. The novel depicts a near future where climate change has upended the established order, and the production of new plastics has been outlawed. The region of Appalachia (or Scrappalachia) has yet again become a valuable area for the extraction of resources and the exploitation of its people, this time with the harvesting of used plastics. Our podcast discussion will explore how Stine’s work embodies aspects of Appalachian literature, dystopian narratives, and climate fiction. After the hosts discuss the novel, there will be time for an audience Q&A.
Title: The Relationship between Video Games and US Foreign Policy
Host: Justin Whittington
Description: The act of playing a video game may not seem impactful at the level of international relations, but is this the case? Our foreign policy decisions have certainly shaped game design decisions like story and setting, but could any influence also flow the other direction? Through examining four areas—military, intelligence, diplomacy, and the 2016 presidential election—the relationship between video games and US foreign policy will be highlighted in brief, utilizing methods from history, political science, media studies, and game studies.
Title: An Hour with Jeni Conrad
Host: Jeni Conrad
Description: Author Jeni Conrad (Don’t Haunt Ghosts, Don’t Bite Vampires, and more) will discuss her background, how she got into writing, and what tools she uses to help her structure writing a whole book, and then if the audience is interested, she will discuss Indie publishing and how that process works. She will also read a snippet of one or two of her books, as time allows. There will also be time for questions.
Title: “How Do You Want to Do This?”: Building Story and Community Through D&D and other TTRPGs
Host: Kallel Peterson
Description: Collaborative storytelling is at the heart of tabletop role playing. While a Game Master or Dungeon Master shapes the basics of a story, campaign, or setting, the world comes alive with players’ interactions. From The Adventure Zone to Critical Role, from the local table to the internationally known, TTRPGs build community and narrative together. We shape both our own enjoyment of our stories and the direction of the games themselves. In this panel, we’ll look at how TTRPGs became popular, how producing narrative works collaboratively in both famous and local groups, and how those evolutions have shaped and become reflected in wider cultural understanding.
Title: So You’d Like To Start A Podcast: A Panel Discussion With Area Podcasters
Location: Room SRCB
Time: 11:00 A.M.
Hosts: Kellie Arbuckle (Only Orcs Podcast), Nuri Collins (Only Orcs Podcast), Justin Tyler (Only Orcs Podcast), Brandon Schreiber (Critically Absurd TV Podcast) and Tobey Wilson (Reel Opposites Podcast).
Moderators: Michelle Alford (HerdCon PopCast) and Heather Lauer (HerdCon PopCast)
Description: Join us for a discussion on podcasting. What motivated and inspired our panelists, how they got started, what kinds of resources are available, why they chose their podcast format, and time for your questions.
Title: Stretching the Medium: How Comic Books Often Tell Unlikely Stories
Location: Room 2W22
Time: 1:00 P.M.
Hosts: Bill Bissett
Description: An exploration of the comic book medium that goes beyond super-heroes. While capes and secret identities tend to be the most popular genre in comic books, comic books have for decades told other stories unrelated to costumed adventurers. From romance to westerns to horror, the comic book medium gives the reader stories as diverse as what we see on television or at the movies. This presentation will not only share the diverse storytelling aspects of the medium but also share the best examples of these different types of stories that the presenter has found in his more than four decades of comic book reading and collecting.
Title: Zine Scene 101
Location: Room SRCB
Time: 1:00 P.M.
Hosts: Elliott Stewart
Description: Have you ever wanted to make your own paper zine? Elliott will teach you how, while also giving an overview of the history of zines.
Title: From “Gaslight” to “Euphoria”: Domestic Violence as the Unseen Narrative
Location: Room 2W22
Time: 2:00 P.M.
Hosts: Sara Blevins (Director of Development, BDVS), Emily Lingenfelter (Court Advocate, BDVS Cabell County) and Amber Ross-Chapman (Director of Client Services, BDVS)
Description: This panel is made up of Branches Domestic Violence Shelter advocates that take a look at how our favorite forms of media, from movies, to TV shows, to comics often center around the unseen narrative of domestic violence. Advocates dive into key moments in pop culture and examine how these moments influence our collective perception and response to relationship violence.