African Americans and Comic Strips

Required Readings:

BPC1700, Chapter 8, “Arts,” pp. 145-151; Figures and Tables, pp. 4 (Tab. 1), 8-10 (Figs. 1-3)

Nancy Goldstein, “Newspapers, Comic Strips, Cartoons,” Jackie Ormes: The First African American Woman Cartoonist (2008)

Christopher P. Lehman, “The New Black Animated Images of 1946,” Journal of Popular Film and Television (2001)

Angela M. Nelson, “African Americans in Comic Strips,” [a collection of select examples of strips from 1939 to 2006]

Text:

BPC1700
Black Popular Culture
(Nelson)
ISBN # 9781121070172

*If you can’t find the text don’t worry about it just complete the paper with the other readings.

Required Websites and/or Video Screening(s):

Pioneering Cartoonists of Color, http://web.mac.com/tim_jackson/iWeb/Tim%20Jackson%20Cartoonist/Salute%20to%20Pioneering%20Cartoonists%20of%20Color.html

Museum of Black Superheroes, http://www.blacksuperhero.com/

Mama’s Boyz, http://www.mamasboyz.com/

Discussion Topic:

African Americans and Comic Strips: Download and review the reading by Angela Nelson, “African Americans in Comic Strips.” Briefly describe the images of African Americans in these strips. Which images are stereotypical? Which images are more realistic? Explain.

Then I need you to respond to these two students responses (Positively Only) to the same question that I provided for you separately in 100 words each for your response to their response to the question.

(Student #1, Jasmine Spratling):

The images in “African Americans and Comic Strips” are very stereotypical while some present very realistic images as well. The way that the authors have the African Americans looking and dressed is one stereotypical component. The young boys are dressed in baggy clothing with afros sitting high on their head, with some even having braids. In one of the comics, they also enlarge the noses and lips which is one stereotypical characteristic that people perceive about African Americans. The images that more realistic are the grown up images in the comic strips where they are seen wearing business attire at their job

(Student #2, Zachery Gase):

Looking at the Mama’s Boyz comic strips I noticed the writes of the comics really try to incorporate useful information in their strips. It is almost as if they’re trying to force awareness of issues such as AIDS and Diabetes into their comics to come off as “socially conscious.” While I don’t really think any of these comics are stereotypical per se, they do come off pretty cheesy and agenda-driven.

Looking at the blog that features old comics from the 1920s, a lot of them feature pretty racist and stereotypical African-American imagery. The “After the Honeymoon” comic in particular is pretty offensive, as it features a black couple and the Black man featured in the comic is pretty stupid. And the way that the characters are drawn is pretty offensive, especially their noses.