Animation: The Global History

Maureen Furniss surveys the cultural, political and economic context of how this dynamic industry evolved, emphasizing both artistic and technical achievements from around the world – from Hollywood to Tokyo, from Moscow to Sydney.

Featuring a timeline for each of its six parts, Animation:

The Global History provides readers with a clear and accessible chronology of events. A ‘Global Storyline’, highlighting the major themes of the era, opens each chapter, and an end-of-book glossary defines key terms used throughout the book.

Topics include:

• Development of animation
• Growth of the studio system
• Stylistic differences between the major studios
• Modernist animation
• Animation in World War II
• International animation
• Experimental animation
• Television animation
• Animation in art and video games

Review

‘Easily one of the best books I have read. If you are involved in the animation industry or educating future animators, this book is a must read and I highly recommend it for your bookshelf and/or classroom ‘ - André Thomas - Texas A&M University, TX, USA

‘An important guide to this medium ... highlights the need to complement the “old” with the “new” to enable the story of animation to continue’ - Jane Batkin - University of Lincoln, UK

‘This erudite, marvellous resource gives us the one-volume overview of the field that we have been waiting for’ - Dr Kirsten Moana Thompson - Victoria University, New Zealand

‘A fantastic textbook that fills a lamentable void in animation studies - thorough and engaging for teachers and students alike, it is now my go-to book for my History of Animation course’ - Matthew Ramsey - Salve Regina University, RI, USA

About the Author

Maureen Furniss is the program director of Experimental Animation at California Institute of the Arts (CalArts). She is the founding editor of Animation Journal (1992–present) and author of several books on the subject. Furniss received the Variety Creative Impact in Animation Education Award 2016, and also won the Animafest Zagreb 2017 Award for Outstanding Contribution to Animation Studies.

Animation: The Global History