Geekesses are princesses

[secondlina]

For some reason, men seem to think holding a pencil requires balls. 
Go to any special comic meeting and the idiot in charge of the interviews will spot you, hunt you down and ask you the same damn question the've been asking for 20 years thinking they are helping out a feminist statement doing so.

Okay.

I'm wondering why this is still a question that needs to be asked. 

In european and american comics, the place of women is still relatively minimal. In european, comics for girls tend to be either unisex comics or sinfully girly ones. The comic audience is still men. I remember reading Spirou (the france equivalent of Jump but for french comics) and they had this special about women in comics. They showed a bunch of "comic heroines" and did a little article about female comic autors. The comic heroines almost all came from series where they serve as eye candy on the side. The article showed a few women from the beginning of the comic book industrie, followed by a gap in time and then a few more artists. American comics have the same odd problem. Comic for girls tend to be unisex (like runaways) or girly (Mary-oh-shoot-me-now-jane). I appreciate the quality of the unisex comics but i'm not sure I appreciate the girly side too much, especially since a lot of those girly comics and written and illustrated by men. 

I remember reading an article about the artist from Y: the last man who is female. She was telling the journalist how she was denied to work on several series because her artwork was "girly" Girly? GIRLY?!! It's the most basic american style ever! It's very similar to fable's drawing style...So how is it girly?

Manga is by far the comic industrie that gives the most space to women, which is most likely why so many of the anime fans are girls. They can relate more to that product. Even then though, Japan is a pretty darn sexist country: Ozamu Tekuza had to cross dress one of his heroins so that she could ride a horse and fight with a sword without putting some of the reader's parents into comatose shock. 

So what is the place of woman in the comic world? I'm not sure. Their place in the fanbase is obviously growing as the place of geek-ess is becoming less and less diminitive socially and more and an association with a group of people.  Geek is not something that marginalizes you anymore. The internet helps a lot. Most of the internet is porn, but a very good segment is dedicated to fandom. Inside the panels, some women still dress with string. I don't think that will ever change. I mean, they style make Jame bond style movies. It's difficult to stop treating women like objects. Men are also starting to be treated like objects in the media too. It's definitly a problem to be looked into.

As for woman in comiking. Humm. That role is growing too. In Japan and Europe, there is a lot of mangaka and bédéistes who are female. However not all of them can find serious work, often because of their "girly (?????)" style. (un)Suprisingly, the american comic business is still pretty hard to get into. It's totally a boy's club there. But then again, it's also a very dog-eat-dog world, so it's hard for everybody. Being the "weaker" (sic) sex just makes you look like an easier victim.

-Secondlina

Comments

:)

[rowenathewitch.livejournal.com]

Well,our comic industry is not on par with the French one...but Italian artists got somehow a big position in the Disney industry, and all the good Disney comics are produced here (like P.K.N.A.: the adventures of Donald as a super hero, Monster Allergy, Mickey's weekly stories etc ) so we are "shining in Disney's reflected light" ;)

W.I.T.C.H may be the first italian comic for girls to become a success, but it's not the first: when I was little there was "Minnie & Company", a special Disney magazine with comics by female artists that featured only the female Disney characters (Minnie, Daisy, Magica De Spell, Gradma Duck and her stories, Brigitta Mc Bridge etc) Boys allowed only as love interests XD
I adored that magazine , there were really memorable stories, too bad it didn't last more than 2-3 years. Re reading it now that I'm an adult, I'm still surprised at how many feminist ideas they managed to hide behind those stories XD and I'm still wondering if they are the reason why I'm a feminist now XD
I read an article about how the comic industrie for girls was totally booming in italy.
Try this article (http://www.lastampa.it/_web/cmstp/tmplrubriche/base/grubrica.asp?ID_blog=47&ID_articolo=67&ID_sezione=70&sezione=) Sorry, it's in italian, but you can translate it with babel fish...

I hope things will get better in Canada ^^

Re: :)

[earthstar-moon.livejournal.com]

I didn't know that WINX club was originally a comic. Is it very different from the cartoon version?

Re: :)

[rowenathewitch.livejournal.com]

Winx Club is both a comic AND a cartoon: they started being published at the same time (it's an artistic decision, i think)
But most effort is put into the cartoon ^^
I've never read the Winx comic ^^, but I've heard it's identical to the cartoon, with just a few new one-shot adventures thrown into the mix from time to time...

Re: :)

[earthstar-moon.livejournal.com]

Ah, (nods,) I've only ever seen the cartoon. I'm not that big of a fan of it (no offense to WINX fans), so I was curious if the comic version was any better. I know that the WITCH comic is a lot better than the cartoon version. Thanks for the info. ^_~