Comics & Ideology (Popular Culture and Everyday Life, Vol. 2)

Book Description
Superman's role in romanticizing commercialism; sexual violence in Japanese manga comics; Wonder Woman as Americanized immigrant; reader's reactions to the gay superhero Northstar; Dilbert as a workplace revolutionary; the Punisher's invasion of Vietnam-these are a few of the issues that Comics & Ideology addresses. Focusing on the intersection of social power and comic art, essays in this book explore how images and narratives in comic books and comic strips may portray social groups and social issues. As a scholarly examination of a form known as "the funnies" or "funny books," this book argues that the themes and characterizations in comic art are often quite serious. Essays take diverse theoretical perspectives such as cultural studies, political economy, feminist criticism, queer studies, and mythic analysis, all focusing on the relationship of comics to issues of social division.


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Cartoon artists have been using their medium as a vehicle for social criticism ever since the Yellow Kid took on slum life; here, a dozen chapters explore how contemporary comic-strip images and narratives portray social groups and issues. Essays look at topics including Superman's role in romanticizing commercialism, sexual violence in Japanese comics, Wonder Woman as Americanized immigrant, the consequences for comic book characters who come out as gay, and Dilbert as a workplace revolutionary. The contributors are academics in journalism and communications, most of them at US universities. Though the book includes a number of illustrations, the b&w reproductions make the cartoons look flat and fuzzy. There is no subject index. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)


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