McCloud Reading Response

Scott McCloud, in his “Vocabulary of Comics,” illustrates (literally) for students the amplification of ideas and universality of icons. His article explains that the reason why audiences relate and react so much to such simple images as a cartoon face is because in our own mind’s eye we are abstract figures. His article illustrates the importance of cartoons and icons by forcing the reader to relate to the cartoon narrator.

           

McCloud’s idea of humans being able to relate better to abstract representations better than real individuals in fascinating, and can actually be observed in Margaret Kantz’s article “Teaching Students How to Use Sources Persuasively”. My students related to Shirley, who is, as Kantz freely admits, not a real person, but an amalgamation of several students. She is generic, and that gives students a clean slate onto which they can paint their own idiosyncrasies.

 

Prewriting Exercise

I find faces in inanimate objects constantly—power outlets, chairs, my toothbrush holder, doorknobs—and I am not alone. The internet is full of memes that feature inanimate objects that look like faces. In fact, it is hard not to see a face, especially once you recognize the eyes, nose, and mouth specifically. I think because humans are a social (and egocentric) people, we look for ourselves everywhere within our surroundings.

 

Questions for Discussion and Journaling

 

1) I think adults still like the simplicity of cartoons because, as McCloud says, cartoons are relatable in a way that highly defined pictures of people are not. Adults can see themselves in cartoon characters. (And we do love seeing ourselves in things). I don’t think there is an age where watching cartoons or reading comics is inappropriate because of the way humans can relate to cartoons. I am sure McCloud would agree because he is writing about complex ideas via a comic format, so that readers will insert themselves into the text.

 

3) I think McCloud is correct in the assumption that if the narrator was more realistic in his depiction, we as readers would be more concerned with the narrator’s own agenda. If a detailed narrator were to make an appearance in McCloud’s article, we would acknowledge his otherness. As it is, the cartoon narrator of McCloud’s article allows us to see ourselves in him, and of course we trust what we tell ourselves. Overall cartoon characters are a “blank slate” onto which we paint ourselves. This all goes back to the egocentricity of humans. We can’t NOT see ourselves in a cartoon.

 

Applying and Exploring Ideas

 

3) Though some adults claim to  have “grown out” of watching cartoons, they still encounter cartoons every day via icons. Whether they are waiting at a crosswalk for the figure that they know means “walk” or they are looking at a cartoon on an appliance that tells them what not to do in order to avoid an electric shock, they encounter and interpret cartoons every day. However, the adults might not realize or pay attention to the fact that they view cartoons daily because they interpret the meanings of the cartoons seamlessly.

 

McCloud’s comic brings to light the importance of icons to audiences, by showing the audience first hand how they see themselves in simplistic images. I think it cleverly illustrates this interesting phenomenon. I can also incorporate McCloud’s work into my own writing. Now that I know we as humans identify with iconic imagery, I can use that knowledge to better explain my ideas to my readers (by eliciting those responses through imagery).