My genre analysis topic was cartoons and the history of the comic strip.

Comic strips first showed

themselves in 1894 when they were implemented by the newspaper of New York World, created by
Joeseph Pulitzer, to gain a competitive edge over competing newspaper The Morning Journal. In
response, The Morning Journal announced that they were going to run a full color, weekly based comic
supplement. That announcement was the first of its kind. The supplement would span 8 pages and ran
the now famous comic strip The Yellow Kidby Richard Outcast. Bot newspapers were fighting for
Outcast at the time. The Morning Journal ended up enticing Outcast to write for them. His comic, The
Yellow Kid, was the first continuous comic character at the time and was set in a large single scene
instead of the narrative strip that is popular today. That comic strip started a genre that all others
following it would model itself after. In creating that strip, Outlast set an earthy, strictly urban farce as
the main, underlying theme which would later grow in complexity and become more sentimental. As well
as creating the backdrop for which all other comic strips would model itself after, The Yellow Kid also
made the speech bubble a standard when writing a comic strip. In 1894, Rudolph Dirks created the comic
strip Katzenjammer Kids,which was based off of the comic strip Max and Moritz. It would turn out to
be a huge success and survived up until the 21st century. The popularity of the comic strip skyrocketed
after Katzenjammer Kids and the spread of comic strips to other newspapers was rapid. The iconic
black and white comic strip was introduced in 1915 with the creation the comic strip Jeff and Mutt,
created by Bud Fisher. From 1905 to the 1920s, the public would see the creation of most of the major
categories that comic strips would take on, like aviation and satire.

The main purpose of this genre was to entice the publics interest in reading the newspapers. It
was a way to set the newspaper apart from the rest and get more sales. If the customer likes a certain
comic that a newspaper has, the customer would be more likely to buy that newspaper because of the
comic. Based on the writers writing style, comic strips can have multiple effects. In Little Orphan

Anne, the author chose to set it in a semi-fantasy world, where good and evil are clear, not in the sense
that the good characters save the day from the bad ones, but in the sense that the good characters
are hardworking, courageous, pious characters. In this comic, traditional values heavily impact the
creation of these characters and are based off of the believe that the good life is a patient, unassuming,
well-ordered one. Other strips, like Martin Michaels Winne Winkle, reflect changes in social norm.
Created in 1920, the comic was a reflection of a post WWI era, where the role a typical women was
supposed to play was changing. Much like the industrial age of 1940, where women took on jobs that
would be normally done by a man during WWII, the role women played after WWI changed
dramatically. Instead of working as a sweatshop laborer or in some kind of factory, women started
becoming secretaries, reporters and fashion designers. The language women used was less formal than it
once was and society started seeing women smoking on the streets, something that would be highly
looked down upon years before. Certain comic strips, like the popular Calvin and Hobbs series, had
characters that would appeal to the younger audience while adding undertones of maturity that adults
would understand. It made you think and often had you scratching your head in confusion as you try and
process how such young characters became surprisingly worldly. Comic strips were critically acclaimed
by most readers due to their ability to expand into multiple genres.

When the comic strip first came out, they were large, basically running the entire width of the
page and could only hold one to two comic strips at a time. Due to the time period, the characters would
be dressed in formal attire, usually a suit or dress, and would be in black and white. Word bubbles would
be used when a character is speaking, with the word bubbles having round edges that made it seem
"soft", or smooth. Comic strip writer often had their individual design for their drawings to reflect the
individuality of that writer. For example, Little Orphan Annie makes use of brilliant shading effects
where the light will gradually evolve into darkness, allowing the reader to tell where the light source is

coming from in that frame. It also uses white, popped-out circles for eyes, much like the book Coraline
did with the black, button eyes. Comics often have transition or narratives boxes that would be used
when the comic had more than one central character that was not in the frame with the other. They would
be used to transition from one character to another or symbolize another event that is occurring at the
same time. They would be in a word box, normally in the top or bottom left hand corner of the frame.
2. Who is the intended audience?
The intended audience for Comic Art in History, in my opinion, are history buffs and students who
are working on projects. This book dives deep into the history of comic strips, where each writer got their
inspiration from and how the strip was influenced by the modern world at the time. (Work in progress)

Becker, Stephen D. Comic Art in America; a Social History of the Funnies, the Political
Cartoons, Magazine Humor, Sporting Cartoons, and Animated Cartoons. New York: Simon
and Schuster, 1959. Print.