Comic Studies THE POTENTIAL OF WAYANG RAMAYANA R.A KOSASIH COMICS AS A MEDIA (KOMPLEMENTER) OF JUNIOR HIGH SCHOOL LEARNING IN CENTRAL JAVA

Local content for junior high school content in Javanese language lessons is the story of Ramayana. Junior high school curriculum version 2013, uses Kidang Kencana story segment in Ramayana as Basic Competence 3 in Semester 2 outcome, and students have difficulty understanding it due to various factors. On the other hand, R.A Kosasih made a wayang comic titled Rama and Sinta (Ramayana). Therefore, the aim of this research is to examine whether the comic Rama and Sinta (Ramayana) can be used as a learning medium for junior high school students in Central Java. This is a qualitative research with an empirical approach. The results of the analysis show that there are similarities in the contents of the story, characters, settings and the story line of the Ramayana between the Javanese language textbook and the comic. Therefore, it can be concluded that the comic Rama and Sinta (Ramayana) can be used as a learning medium in Javanese language subjects through language translation, because the content is in accordance with the curriculum.

Making Space for Myth: Worldbuilding and Interconnected Narratives in Mythspace

The comics medium has long proven to be fertile ground for worldbuilding, spawning not only imaginary worlds but multiverses that have become international transmedial franchises. In the Philippines, komiks (as it is called locally) has provided the Filipino popular imagination with worlds populated by superheroes, super spies, supernatural detectives, and creatures from different Philippine mythologies. The komiks series Mythspace, written by Paolo Chikiamco and illustrated by several artist-collaborators, takes the latter concept, and launches it into outer space. Classified by its own writer as a “Filipino space opera” consisting of six loosely interconnected stories, Mythspace presents a storyworld where the creatures of Philippine lower mythologies are based on various alien species that visited the Philippines long ago. The article will examine the use of interconnected narratives as a strategy for worldbuilding in Mythspace. Drawing from both subcreation and comic studies, this article posits that interconnected narratives is a worldbuilding technique particularly well-suited to comics, and that the collaborative nature of the medium allows for a diversity of genres and visual styles that can be used by future komiks creators to develop more expansive storyworlds.

The Mask as Anti-Apparatus

The thesis is that the graphic novel operates according to a logic of inversion, a very particular volte-face in which the anti-apparatus of the mask institutes a politics of impersonality. The idea as non-person. The comedy of the comic, the commedia dell’arte of the mask, the anti-apparatus of proliferated impersonality, the theatrics of belonging to the community of those who do not belong, becomes the driving figure of the film and even more so, of its afterlife, its viral and political role in resistance from Wall Street to Wollongong, Brazil to Bahrain, Harlem to Hong Kong. The film arrives as the fulfillment of the graphic lore, uniquely mobilizing comic studies as a praxis, making a movie that moves the comedy of depicting the person, the caricature of the cartoon, on to the streets.

El cómic: ¿un arte secuencial?

Resumen: En 1993, Scott McCloud publicó su primer ensayo teórico sobre cómic y en forma de cómic: Entender el cómic: el arte invisible, cuyo éxito inmediato lo convirtió en una de las principales referencias en los estudios sobre cómic. En su obra, McCloud definía el cómic como un arte estrictamente secuencial, y planteaba una clasificación de las transiciones entre viñetas que partía de su concepto de clausura. Tras identificar ciertas limitaciones de sus teorías, se plantea una crítica de estos puntos mediante el análisis de obras y la revisión de bibliografía especializada, y se proponen alternativas de análisis más apropiadas para el cómic contemporáneo. Abstract: In 1993, Scott McCloud published his first essay about comic in comic format: Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art, whose early success turned it to one of the main references in comic studies. In his work, McCloud defined comic as a strictly sequential art, and raised a classification of panels transitions that came from his concept of closure. After identifying certain limitations of his theories, a critique to these points through the analysis of some comics and the use of specialized bibliography is presented, and some more suitable alternatives for contemporary comics are proposed.

A Once and Future Pedagogy

In this chapter the editors offer an overview of the need for a comics pedagogy and center the work of this volume’s scholarship within traditions of comic studies, critical theory, and curriculum studies.

The Supervillain Reader

It’s been argued that every good superhero needs an equally compelling supervillain. The Supervillain Reader sheds light on why “it’s all about the villain.” The editors have assembled a collection of both reprinted and original essays that tries to answer the question, Why are we so fascinated with the villain in our storytelling? The obsession with the villain is not some new phenomenon, and in fact one finds villains who are “super” going as far back as ancient religious and mythological texts. This innovative collection brings together essays, book excerpts, and original content from a wide variety of scholars and writers, weaving a tapestry of thought regarding villains in all their manifestations, including film, literature, television, games, and, of course, comics and sequential art. While The Supervillain Readerfocuses on the latter, it goes beyond comic studies to show how the concept of the supervillain is part our larger historical and popular consciousness. The principal goal of this reader is to collect in a single volume articles that show how the villain is a complex part of any narrative regardless of original text. The villain must be compelling, stimulating, and pro-active, whereas the superhero (or protagonist) is most often re-active. Our reader brings into clear focus the unique aspects of villainy and shows why the villain is so compelling, while also providing a theoretical foundation for villainy in numerous media. The editors have carefully curated this collection, and we hope it will be of interest to professors teaching graduate and undergraduate courses, the students they teach, and serious observers of popular culture across professions.

JUKSTAPOSISI FOTOGRAFI DI NOVEL GRAFIS ‘THE PHOTOGRAPHER’

AbstrakPenelitian ini hendak mengkaji fungsi-fungsi dokumenter dalam karya fotografi yang divisualisasikan berdampingan dengan gambar-gambar komik dalam sebuah novel grafis berjudul ‘The Photographer: Into War-Torn Afghanistan with Doctors without Borders’. Tujuan dari penelitian ini adalah untuk mencari tahu apakah nilai dokumenter karya foto bisa tetap diapresiasi layaknya foto dokumenter ataukah ada peralihan fungsi ketika dua jenis piktorial disandingkan bersamaan. Metode penelitian yang digunakan untuk menganalisis adalah metode kualitatif yang menganggap bahwa setiap petunjuk adalah penting untuk dianalisis. Kemudian potongan-potongan informasi yang didapat dikaji dengan pendekatan fotografi dokumenter. Diharapkan hasil penelitian ini dapat memberikan kontribusi dalam ranah ilmu kajian fotografi sekaligus kajian komik (comic studies). Dalam ranah fotografi, fotografi dokumenter akan makin ‘berbicara’ dan memaksimalkan fungsinya ketika terbantu dengan teks piktorial lain. Untuk ranah kajian komik, hadirnya citraan fotografi justru akan memperjelas pesan yang hendak disampaikan kepada khalayak melalui gambar-gambarnya. Kata kunci: jukstaposisi, fotografi, novel grafis, dokumenter AbstractJuxtaposition of Photography in a Graphic Novel Titled ‘The Photographer’. This research studied the documentary function in photography works visualized side to side with the comic drawings in a graphic novel titled ‘The Photographer:Into War-Torn Afghanistan with Doctors without Borders’. The aim of this research was to find out whether the documentary photographs are still appreciated as they are, or there are any changes of function when those two pictorials are juxtaposed. The method employed in this research was qualitative method which considered that each clue was important to be analyzed. Then, each of them would be studied using approaches from the view point of documentary photography. The result of this research hopefully could give a contribution to the photography studies and comic studies. Photographs will ‘speak louder’ and will have their greatest value when supported by other kind of pictorials. While in comic studies, the photographs will be able to send messages better through their drawings when juxtaposed with photographs. Keywords: juxtaposition, photography, graphic novel, documentary

Comics and Sacred Texts

Comics and Sacred Texts: Reimagining Religion and Graphic Narratives explores how comics and notions of the sacred interweave to produce new modes of seeing and understanding the sacred. The creative texts explored within this edited volume share an expressive interest in modes of seeing the sacred in graphic structures. We examine the intersections between religion and comics in ways that critically expand our ability to think well about religious landscapes, rhetorical practices, pictorial representation, and the everyday experiences of the uncanny. Sacred Texts and Comics engages the diverse and expansive universe of comic studies and its capacity to reveal new modalities of the sacred. We explore how the sacred erupts in places, and through mediums, that challenge where we should see and encounter divine presence. Comics also reimagine sacred texts, and move readers to see traditional texts anew. But the sacred also has limits and borders, so we look at monsters and wizards in comic books, and how these beings challenge visual assumptions about the normal and the sacred. Finally, we show how comics reveal the everyday sacred: a presence in the mundane, common, and often overlooked features of familiar existence. Collectively, the essays in Sacred Texts and Comics reveal how comics, as a visual medium, moves readers to reimagine the sacred. We claim that seeing the sacred is a learned practice: we must learn where to look for and how to envision the sacred.