REINVENTING COMIC CULTURE - SCOTT McCLOUD / Reinventando la cultura del cómic.

Hi my dear friends, do you like comics? Today we are going to know more about comics but through Scott McCloud, the comic expert who has reinvented comic culture! I hope you'll like it!


Hola mis queridos amigos ¿os gustan los comics? Hoy vamos a saber más sobre los cómics pero a través de Scott McCloud, el experto en comics ¡que ha reinventado la cultura del cómic! Espero que os guste.

Info:  Speak Up magazine.
Photos:  rtve.es  /  amazon.es  /  siguealconejoblanco.es  /  eldiario.es



REINVENTING COMIC CULTURE  BY SCOTT McCLOUD

Scott McCloud has been called "the Aristotle of Comics" even though he says he finds that embarrassing. He is, however, an expert on the subject, having written such books -in comic form- as "Understanding Comics and Reinventing Comics".  His latest production is less theoretical: it's his first graphic novel and it's called "The Sculptor".

Being asked about comics' changing readership he says that in North America there are now more young readers who are girls than boys. Comics is changing...the gender balance in comics is changing enormously, too. This is partially because of the Manga explosion: Japanese comics jumped the pond in a big way about 15 years ago and a lot of those Japanese comics readers, Manga readers, they're growing up and they're making comics of their own now.

He also says that comics audience is largely a female audience. McCloud thinks that such a big demographic time bomb may have more women and girls reading comics, and making comics, in 10 years than men and boys.  A kind of storytelling  that has been missing in comics for many years, is being rediscovered and it's all to the best! 

SUPERMAN!

So why have comics traditionally had a male readership? 

Scott McCloud says that we have these competing philosophies of history, the movements in history. Some go with "the great man" theory, that a single person can have this outsized effect on societies and even world history and some think that there's a kind of cultural inevitability in the movement of cultures. The same thing is true with art. There is a debate between those who think a single artist can have a tremendous effect on a culture, and those who think that, that culture's trajectory was predetermined by the nature of that culture. I'm on "the great man" side of that. I've seen how, one artist  can influence a culture. Osama Tezuka in Japan completely rewired the way the Japanese thought about comics as did Hergé in Europe, and both of them led to different results.

Well, so did Siegel and Shuster. So did the two kids from Cleveland who created Superman back in the United States. And what we see is that success breeds success!

AN INTERNATIONAL MARKET 

But the popularity of comics seems to vary from country to country.

Scott McCloud says about this that when it comes to one's own chosen art form, of course, the grass is always greener on the other side of the street and in America we've always been very envious of Europe generally because of the Franco-Belgian tradition and then Europe-wide, there's been a different attitude about comics but each country is different. In Italy, for instance, there are conflicting trends and conflicting currents.

Scott declares that there's certainly a great appreciation for some of the great art comics of the last 50 years or so, but there are also come prejudices that are similar to North America as well. The same is true of Japan, in fact. The same is true even of France which has the reputation of being a haven for comics lovers everywhere.

VOCABULARY

-READERASHIP: lectores, público.
-GENDER: género.
-JUMPED THE POND: cruzar el charco, el océano.
-OUTSIZED: desmesurado.
-TO REWIRE: transformar.
-TO BREED: generar.
-TO PLUCK OUT: extraer.
-HAVEN: paraíso.


EXERCISES

1 Choose the correct option.

a) Scott McCloud is an internationally recognised expert  ON/ OF  the subject of comic books.
b) The readership gender balance has changed because  ON / OF  Manga.
c) Tezuka changed the way the Japanese thought AROUND /ABOUT  comics.
d) The grass is always greener  ON / AT the other side of the street.
e) There is a great appreciation ON / FOR the art comics of the last 50 years.
f) France has the reputation OF/ ON being a haven for comics lovers.


2 Match the nouns used in the text to their synonyms.

PHILOSOPHY
DEBATE
MOVEMENT

a) belief   /  b) drive  /  c/ argument  /  d) discussion  /  e) push  /  f) thrust  /  g) concept  /  h) deliberation  /  i) idea


                                                  *********************************

SOLUTIONS TO THE EXERCISES.

1.- a) on  b) of  c) about  d) on  e) for  f) of

2.- Philosophy> a, g, i  /  Debate:  c, d, h  /  Movement: b, e, f



THANK YOU FOR BEING THERE!!!

HAVE A NICE DAY!!!