Thesis (MPhil)--Stellenbosch University, 2008. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This thesis examines the genre of dystopian fiction in the graphic novel, V for Vendetta in which a futuristic police state, run by a totalitarian regime is portrayed. Since V for Vendetta draws on a number of other dystopian texts, New Historicist theory is employed which begins its analysis of literary texts by attempting to look at other texts as well as the historical context in which it originated, to aid in the understanding of that text. Therefore, V for Vendetta with its thorough character development and multi-dimensional storyline that the larger format of the graphic novel allows, is studied alongside other highly regarded novels. The characteristics of the nightmarish anti-utopia is identified and analysed in V for Vendetta by looking at real examples of totalitarian regimes from history. The chapters are divided into what I identified as the main themes of the totalitarian dystopia. Chapter one explains the concept of the utopia in order to grasp the concept of dystopia, and more specifically, the Totalitarian dystopia. Chapter two looks at the social structure of V for Vendetta as well as the common Totalitarian dystopia. Chapter three discusses the issue of censorship which is a recurring theme in dystopian fiction. Chapter four examines the manner in which the totalitarian regime manipulates the populace of the dystopia through propaganda. Chapter five discusses the systems of surveillance and lack of privacy in the Totalitarian dystopia and a chapter on the protagonist in dystopia concludes this study. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: In hierdie studiestuk word die genre van distopiese fiksie in die grafiese roman, V for Vendetta behandel, wat ’n futuristiese polisiestaat teen die agtergrond van ’n totalitêre staatsbestel uitbeeld. Omdat V for Vendetta by soveel ander distopiese tekste leen, word dit vanuit die teoretiese oogpunt van New Historicism bestudeer, wat in die ontleding van ’n roman ander tekste asook die geskiedkundige konteks van daardie roman ondersoek, ten einde dit beter te begryp. Daarom word V for Vendetta, wat vanweë die grafiese roman se langer formaat wat ruimte skep vir deeglike karakterontwikkeling en ’n veelvlakkige storielyn, as volwaardige roman naas ander hoogaangeskrewe romans behandel. Aan die hand van ware voorbeelde van totalitêre regimes uit die geskiedenis word die eienskappe eie aan ’n nagmerriestaat in V for Vendetta geïdentifiseer en geanaliseer en dit is waardeur ek my laat lei het ten opsigte van die hoofstukindeling. In hoofstuk een word die begrip van utopie eers duidelik gemaak om die distopie, en meer spesifiek die Totalitêre distopie te verstaan. In hoofstuk twee word daar gekyk na die sosiale samestelling en magstruktuur binne V for Vendetta en die Totalitêre distopie in die algemeen. Hoofstuk drie bespreek die kwessie van sensuur - ’n gewilde tema in distopiese fiksie. In hoofstuk vier word ondersoek ingestel na die manier waarop die Totalitêre-distopie die burgery breinspoel deur propaganda. Hoofstuk vyf bespreek die verskynsel van bewaking en die skending van privaatheid in die totaliêre distopie en in die sesde hoofstuk word daar gefokus op die protagonis in die distopie.

Mon projet de thèse démontre comment le genre de la bande dessinée peut être mobilisé de façon à déstabiliser les idéologies identitaires dominantes dans un contexte autobiographique. À partir de théories contemporaines de récits de vie et de leurs emphase sur la construction du sujet au travers du processus autobiographique, j’explore les façons par lesquelles les propriétés formelles de la bande dessinée permettent aux artistes féminines et minoritaires d’affirmer leurs subjectivités et de s’opposer aux idéaux hégémoniques reliés à la représentation du genre, du traumatisme, de la sexualité, de l’ethnicité, et du handicap, en s’auto-incarnant à même la page de bande dessinée. Par une analyse visuelle formelle, ma thèse prouve que les esthétiques hyper-personnelles du dessin à la main découlant d’une forme ancrée dans l’instabilité générique et le (re)mixage continu des codes verbaux et visuels permettent aux artistes de déstabiliser les régimes de représentation conventionnels dans une danse complexe d’appropriation et de resignification qui demeure toujours ouverte à la création de nouveaux sens. Suite à l’introduction, mon second chapitre explique la résistance de Julie Doucet par rapport aux plaisirs visuels découlant de la contemplation des femmes dans la bande dessinée par son utilisation du concept originairement misogyne de la matérialité féminine grotesque comme principe génératif à partir duquel elle articule une critique de la forme et du contenu des représentations normatives et restrictives du corps féminin. Le troisième chapitre considère la capacité de la bande dessinée à représenter le traumatisme, et se penche sur les efforts de Phoebe Gloeckner visant à faire face aux abus sexuels de son enfance par l’entremise d’un retour récursif sur des souvenirs visuels fondamentaux. Le chapitre suivant maintient que la nature sérielle de la bande dessinée, sa multimodalité et son association à la culture zine, fournissent à Ariel Schrag les outils nécessaires pour expérimenter sur les codes visuels et verbaux de façon à décrire et à affirmer le sens identitaire en flux de l’adolescent queer dans sa quadrilogie expérimentale Künstlerroman. Le cinquième chapitre suggère que l’artiste de provenance Libanaise Toufic El Rassi utilise la forme visuelle pour dénoncer les mécanismes générateurs de préjugés anti-Arabes, et qu’il affirme son identité grâce au pouvoir de rhétorique temporaire que lui procure l’incarnation d’un stéréotype connu. Mon dernier chapitre démontre comment Al Davison emploie la bande dessinée pour mettre en scène des rencontres d’observations dynamiques avec le spectateur implicite pouvant potentiellement aider l’auteur à éviter le regard objectivant généralement associé à la perception du handicap. / This dissertation argues that the comics form can be mobilized to destabilize dominant notions of identity in an autobiographical context. Drawing on current theories of life writing that stress the construction of the self through the autobiographical process, it explores how the specific formal properties of comics provide opportunities for women and minority artists to assert subjectivity and contend with hegemonic ideas concerning the representation of gender, trauma, sexuality, ethnicity, and disability through the embodiment of the self on the comics page. Through formal visual analysis, the dissertation shows how the highly personal and hand-drawn aesthetics of a form that thrives on generic instability and the continual (re)mixing of verbal and visual codes allows artists to destabilize conventional representational schemes in a complex dance of appropriation and resignification that is always open to the creation of new meanings. Following the introduction, Chapter 2 shows how Julie Doucet resists the visual pleasure associated with looking at women in comics by using the originally misogynistic concept of grotesque female materiality as a generative principle from where she articulates a critique in both form and content of normative and restricting representations of the female body. Chapter 3 examines the comics form’s ability to depict trauma, and focuses on Phoebe Gloeckner’s attempts to come to terms with childhood sexual abuse through a recursive return to key visual memories. Chapter 4 argues that the form’s serial nature, multimodality, and association with zine culture provides Ariel Schrag with the tools to experiment with visual and verbal codes in order to delineate and assert a sense of the in-flux and queer teenage self in an experimental four-volume Künstlerroman. Chapter 5 argues that Lebanese-born artist Toufic El Rassi uses the visual form to expose the mechanism behind the production of anti-Arab prejudice, and that he asserts personal identity through the temporary rhetorical power afforded by the inhabitation of a known stereotype. Chapter 6 shows how Al Davison employs the comics form to stage dynamic staring encounters with the implied observer that have the potential to help the author elude the objectifying gaze commonly associated with looking at disability.

Thesis (M.A. (English))--University of the Witwatersrand, Faculty of Humanities, 2016. / This dissertation examines how particular combinations of image and text in sequential art reflect specific social, historical and political contexts. The analysis of how meaning is constructed is done through consideration of three iterations of the Batman superhero character, and argues for an eventual postmodernisation of the character. The first case study presented is the original version of Batman as it debuted in 1939, which naturally established much of the substance from which later depictions would take their cues. The second case study used is the “camp” 1960s TV series starring Adam West, which was influenced by the highly restricted Batman comics under the Comics Code Authority established in 1954. The main case study, and the central focus of this dissertation, is Batman – Arkham Asylum (1989), a graphic novel by Grant Morrison and Dave McKean, the latest of the three iterations, which represents the eventual disruption of the enforced or constructed harmony evident in the earlier versions of the character into a fracturing and fragmentation both of the world and the self. It is a version of Batman that privileges the interiority and psychological complexity of the character, representing a culmination of the 1980s shift toward a more mature audience with its incorporation of horror, violence and mental turmoil. These three examples are compared and contrasted, showing how each constructs a particular meaning using its own unique combination of image and text. Having established a historicity for the character and having constructed an argument for how Batman as a cultural icon echoes shifts in society, the focus of the dissertation is transferred to a deeper analysis of Arkham and attempts to trace more explicitly its status as a postmodern text by examining its fragmentary nature, its use of intertextuality and how meaning in Arkham is constructed in the mind. Following this, an exploration of the central theme of madness in the graphic novel is provided in order to show how the work both critiques the representation of madness in fiction as well as how the liminal setting of the asylum functions as part of the postmodernisation of Batman by creating a “landscape of madness” where irrationality and the uncanny dominate reality, in contrast to the logical, “left-brain” treatment of Batman which had become common prior to Arkham Asylum. The analysis of the three iterations is shaped by WTJ Mitchell’s theories on imagetext relationships and additionally by the principles of sequential art outlined by Scott McCloud. The postmodern theoretical framework is informed by John Docker’s explorations of fragmentation, intertextuality, inversion and the Carnivalesque. Additionally, the writings of Lillian Feder and Michel Foucault will inform the discussion of madness in Arkham. / GR2017

The depictions of women in film noir and neo-noir have long been objects of interest for feminist scholars. In this report, I extend this scholarship to examine Frank Miller's Sin city graphic novel series as a version of neo-noir that is both intimately connected to noir tradition and innovative in its approach, specifically in terms of his representation of women. Miller depicts his female characters in a variety of ways that reflect both the positive and negative imagery of women in classic noir and neo-noir; in doing so, he creates a new and complex vision of women in noir. This report uses three different characterizations of women in film noir--the spider woman, the femme moderne, and the angel--to explore the ways in which Miller's female characters can be understood to simultaneously uphold and challenge these conventions. / text

This study has analyzed the relationship between trauma and otherness in two autobiographical graphic narratives. The study suggests that autobiographical graphic narratives are better equipped to represent the effects, mainly that of otherness, on the self as a result of trauma. In the ten volume manga series Barefoot Gen, Keiji Nakazawa details his childhood survival of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima during World War II. As he rebuilds his life, fellow survivals that look like his deceased family members recall his trauma of the bombing. Like we see in Nakazawa’s Barefoot Gen, Art Spiegelman also uses repetitious imagery and a fragmentary form of comic narration to represent the experience of trauma throughout In the Shadow of No Towers. However, while Nakazawa repeats specific imagery of the atomic bombing throughout Barefoot Gen based on his eyewitness testimony, Spiegelman manipulates imagery of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks to reject the notion that only one specific set of images can represent a traumatic event. Thus, by the end of the second section of In the Shadow of No Towers, Spiegelman creates a multiplicity of images to reenact the trauma of 9/11. / Access to thesis permanently restricted to Ball State community only.

Orientador: Álvaro Luiz Hattnher / Banca: Fábio Akcelrud Durão / Banca: Orlando Nunes de Amorim / Resumo: O presente trabalho analisa a descentralização do paladino super-heróico na narrativa Invincible (2003), de Robert Kirkman. Para tanto, toma a personagem Super-Homem como arquétipo narrativo de super-herói e modelo criador do conceito paladinesco nos comic books e, por isso, recorta algumas das variadas histórias desta personagem que é narrada desde a década de 40. O enfoque da seleção foram as recriações e re-narrações do universo diegético do Homem de Aço, que, em conjunto com o estudo comparativo da narrativa gráfica de Kirkman, forneceram elementos para observar e comprovar a descentralização do conceito do super-herói paladino. O conceito de descentralização foi retirado das teorias sociais de Zygmund Bauman (2005) e de Stuart Hall (2009), acerca da crise de identidade do sujeito pós-moderno, e compreendido aqui como o deslocamento da identidade, sua liquidez. Portanto, sua aplicação como ferramenta de análise de narrativas é desenvolvida pela evidenciação das relações intertextuais que o universo de Invencível possui com as histórias do Super-Homem, dessa forma, demonstrando por meio das referências textuais, como a mudança dentro do paladino está relacionada a crise de identidade / Abstract: The present work analyses the super-heroic paladin decentralization in Robert Kirkman's narrative, Invincible (2003). Because of this, it takes the Superman character as the narrative archetype and the creator model of the paladin concept in the comic books, so it selects some of the many stories of this character narrated since the 40s. The re-creations and the retelling of the Man of Steel's diegetic universe were the focus of the selection to, in union with the comparative study of Robert Kirkman's graphic narrative, Invincible (2003), look and prove the super-hero paladin concept's decentralization in Kirkman's narrative. The decentralization concept is taken from the social theories of Zygmund Bauman (2005) and Stuart Hall (2009) about the post modern subject crisis and its understood here as the identity's displacement, it's liquidity. Therefore it's application as a tool to narrative analyses is developed by the demonstration of the intertextetual relationship that the Invincible universe shows towards Superman stories, thus showing by textual references how the paladin changing is related to the identity crisis / Mestre

Made available in DSpace on 2016-08-03T16:15:34Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Marco Tulio pag 1_100.pdf: 2516116 bytes, checksum: a33de625db3d74cc989a6d94a22806bb (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012-03-21 / This research proposes the use of comics (comic strips; comic books and graphic novels) to teach History in Elementary Schools and High Schools. By the comics content analysis, this research will offer as suggestions on how comics can be used as historical sources to study an specific age or period as support or reference to stimulate thinking about the origins of the anachronisms found in the stereotypes and other popular images traditionally associated to past cultures. This research intends to identify which are the main difficulties, challenges or even limitations avoiding a better and more constant use of the comics as a tool to teach History. / O projeto propõe estabelecer um suporte teórico e metodológico para a utilização das HQs no ensino da História pelos professores de História que trabalham no ciclo 2 do ensino fundamental e no ensino médio. Através da análise do conteúdo das HQs, esta pesquisa fornecerá sugestões práticas de como as HQs tanto podem ser usadas como fonte documental para o estudo de determinada época quanto podem ser material de apoio para promover em sala de aula reflexões sobre a gênese dos anacronismos encontrados nas representações de culturas do passado. Pretende identificar avanços e também as principais dificuldades, obstáculos ou mesmo limites que ainda impedem um uso mais freqüente ou proveitoso desse recurso no ensino de História.

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