DAY 1/2
by Eva Van de Wiele and Dona Pursall
The digital symposium Sugar and Spice, and the Not So Nice: Comics Picturing Girlhood was launched on 22 April 2021 with a profound and personal keynote by Mel Gibson. Using herself as a case study she reflected on being a reader, a librarian, a scholar and an individual who, in a variety of fields, has represented non-standard notions of ‘girl’. In workshops for librarians, teachers and scholars, Gibson uses comics for object elicitation, allowing her to encourage others to reconsider themselves as child comics readers and the complex ideologies knotted up in this experience. Gibson’s work provokes the notion of the individual as a role model, a unique and precise representation with particular qualities, interests and passions. Using restorative nostalgia entails not just reflecting back on but, also, resisting shame and embarrassment, forgiving and accepting ourselves as the child readers we were. Gibson shows a respect for the powerful and evocative materiality of comics and offers a compassionate model for identity. Whilst speaking personally about comics reading, Gibson engaged with discourses of hierarchy, child development and affect, interrogating the simple truth that what we read is part of making us who we are.
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Tags: access, adventure, aesthetics, affect, agency, autoethnography, biography, body, censorship, Child characters, child development, children readers, comics, COMICS project, coming of age, curiosity, dance, disability, disobedience, economics, Emmanuel Guibert, empathy, Escape from Syria, ethics, Europe, exploration, family, feminism, Gender, gender roles, genre, girl protagonists, girlhood, Giulia Pex, gutters, hierarchy, Hilda and the Black Hound, identity, independent women, insecurity, isolation, Italy, Jeg rømmer, Joann Sfar, Khalat, Lars Horneman, liberated women, Luke Pearson, Lumberjanes, Mari Kanstad Johnsen, Marvel, materiality of comics, Mirabelle, mobility, Mophead, Morten Dürr, neurodiversity, news narratives, nostalgia, objectification, operationalised invisibility, oppression, otherness, Pacifica youth, parenthood, queering, reader response, refugee experiences, representation, resistance, Samya Kullab, Sardine, second wave feminism, Selina Tusitala Marsh, shame and embarrassment, silence, social commentary, societal rules, song, status and authority, subjugation, Syria, Sıdıka, teenage culture, The Unstoppable Wasp, trauma, Turkey, twentieth century, Valentina Mela Verde, values, vulnerability, women’s magazines, working young women, Zenobia
I. Who is Ishiko Junzō?[1]
Arguably, one of the first Japanese critics to discuss graphic narratives (story manga) for mature audiences is Ishiko Junzō (1928 – 1977).[2] Initially active as an art critic who explored a wide range of contemporaneous artistic and popular movements, he began to publish writings more specifically on manga between the mid-1960s and mid-1970s. To many English-language readers his name might be obscure, perhaps even more so than his contemporary, philosopher and cultural critic Tsurumi Shunsuke, whose book Sengo Nihon no taishū bunkashi (A Cultural History of Postwar Japan 1945-1980)—a chapter of which is devoted to postwar manga—is available in English. Yet, in present-day Japanese-language manga research, Ishiko is repeatedly referenced, especially in relation to his media-specific discussion of manga. This article shall introduce art critic Ishiko Junzō and his scholarship, concentrating on his contribution to Japanese comics criticism and manga studies.
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Tags: adult readership, aesthetics, alternative comics, alternative manga, art, Artists, “anti-art” movements, censorship, Charles Hatfield, children readers, comics industry, Dick Higgins, digital media, Doryun Chong, dōjinshi, education, fandom, film, formalism, Garo, gekiga, Gondō Suzumu, graphic narratives, historiography, hyōgen-ron, intermediality, Ishiko Junzō, Japan, Japanese manga, jaqueline berndt, Kajii Jun, Kajiya Kenji, kashihon-ya, Kikuchi Asajirō, Magnificent 49ers, manga, manga criticism, Manga geijutsu-ron, manga studies, Manga to eiga, Mangashugi, mature readers, Miryam Sas, Miwa Kentarō, Mizuki Shigeru, MOMA, Negative Perceptions of Comics, Osamu Tezuka, psychology, Scott McCloud, seinen, Shirato Sanpei, shōjo, social class, structuralism, taishū bunka, Takano Shinzō, Tatsumi Yoshihiro, Tezuka, Tezuka Osamu, Tsuge Yoshiharu, Tsurumi Shunsuke, Uryū Yoshimitsu, USA, Walter Benjamin, Weekly Shōnen Magazine, Yamane Sadao
The comic market in the Western world today is heterogeneous and complex. However, I suggest it can be divided into three main segments, or groups of readers (see also the American market commentaries Alexander 2014, Alverson 2013): the first segment are manga fans, many of which also like anime and other kinds of Japanese pop culture. The second segment are comic fans in a narrower sense, who, at least in America, read mostly superhero comic books, and other comics from the genres of science fiction and fantasy. These are the ‘fanboys and true believers’ that Matthew J. Pustz writes about in his book Comic Book Culture (Pustz 1999). Finally, the third segment is the general public. These readers are not fans, but only casual readers of comics – mostly so-called “graphic novels”, newspaper strips and collections thereof, and the occasional bestseller such as the latest Asterix album.
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Tags: Akira, Albin Michel, Archie, autobiography, Barefoot Gen, Bleach, censorship, Comics Buyer's Guide, Der Spiegel, Dragon Ball, economics, fandom, Fantasy Advertiser, First Comics, First Publishing, Frank Miller, Frederick Schodt, gekiga, Graphic Novels, Gōseki Kojima, I Saw It, Ittō Ogami, Japan, Japan Inc., Japanese manga, Katsuhiro Otomo, Kazuo Koike, Keiji Nakazawa, Kozure Ōkami, Lone Wolf and Cub, Lynn Varley, Macao, Mai the Psychic Girl, manga, Manga Nihon Keizai Nyūmon, Martin Skidmore, Matthew J. Pustz, medieval comics, Naruto, Negative Perceptions of Comics, Norman Rentrop, One Piece, Peter Odrich, Rraah!, Sailor Moon, Sexual Violence, Shōtarō Ishinomori, superheroes, Superman, The Legend of Kamui, Translations, University of California Press, USA, Weekly Manga Action
Comics Forum 
Symposium Report: Sugar and Spice, and the Not So Nice: Comics Picturing Girlhood
DAY 1/2
by Eva Van de Wiele and Dona Pursall
The digital symposium Sugar and Spice, and the Not So Nice: Comics Picturing Girlhood was launched on 22 April 2021 with a profound and personal keynote by Mel Gibson. Using herself as a case study she reflected on being a reader, a librarian, a scholar and an individual who, in a variety of fields, has represented non-standard notions of ‘girl’. In workshops for librarians, teachers and scholars, Gibson uses comics for object elicitation, allowing her to encourage others to reconsider themselves as child comics readers and the complex ideologies knotted up in this experience. Gibson’s work provokes the notion of the individual as a role model, a unique and precise representation with particular qualities, interests and passions. Using restorative nostalgia entails not just reflecting back on but, also, resisting shame and embarrassment, forgiving and accepting ourselves as the child readers we were. Gibson shows a respect for the powerful and evocative materiality of comics and offers a compassionate model for identity. Whilst speaking personally about comics reading, Gibson engaged with discourses of hierarchy, child development and affect, interrogating the simple truth that what we read is part of making us who we are.
Read the rest of this entry »Share this:
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Posted by Annick Pellegrin on 2021/06/14 in Conference reports
Tags: access, adventure, aesthetics, affect, agency, autoethnography, biography, body, censorship, Child characters, child development, children readers, comics, COMICS project, coming of age, curiosity, dance, disability, disobedience, economics, Emmanuel Guibert, empathy, Escape from Syria, ethics, Europe, exploration, family, feminism, Gender, gender roles, genre, girl protagonists, girlhood, Giulia Pex, gutters, hierarchy, Hilda and the Black Hound, identity, independent women, insecurity, isolation, Italy, Jeg rømmer, Joann Sfar, Khalat, Lars Horneman, liberated women, Luke Pearson, Lumberjanes, Mari Kanstad Johnsen, Marvel, materiality of comics, Mirabelle, mobility, Mophead, Morten Dürr, neurodiversity, news narratives, nostalgia, objectification, operationalised invisibility, oppression, otherness, Pacifica youth, parenthood, queering, reader response, refugee experiences, representation, resistance, Samya Kullab, Sardine, second wave feminism, Selina Tusitala Marsh, shame and embarrassment, silence, social commentary, societal rules, song, status and authority, subjugation, Syria, Sıdıka, teenage culture, The Unstoppable Wasp, trauma, Turkey, twentieth century, Valentina Mela Verde, values, vulnerability, women’s magazines, working young women, Zenobia