Interpreting
Batman: The following is a list of sources that are
available either online or at the library.
Bacon-Smith, Camille
and Tyrone Yarbrough. "Batman: the Ethnography." The Many Lives
of the Batman: Critical Approaches to a Superhero and his Media.
Roberta Pearson and William Uricchio, eds. New York: Routledge Press,
1991.
Bacon-Smith and Yabrough
analyze the response to Tim Burton's Batman movie among both general
audiences and comic book fans, detailing the composition and interpretive
processes of the two groups, and in particular the importance that
the character of Batman holds for them. Through ethnographic observation
and interviews at a theater, a comics shop, and a comics convention,
this article explains the contrasting responses of comics fans and
non-fans through their different interpretive contexts. Many comic
book fans were disappointed by the movie's failure to continue the
narrative world they already knew. Yet they also wanted to like the
film, both because Batman was already important to them and because
they felt that the acceptance of Batman by mainstream audiences reflected,
to some extent, acceptance of comic book fans (Summary
from "Geek
Culture").
"Batman and Joker
-- Different Sides
of the Same Coin?" Student Essay: http://www.essaypage.com/categories/143-026.html
This 7 page report discusses
the 1989 blockbuster movie ³Batman² starring Michael Keaton and Jack
Nicholson. However, this report compares the actual characters of
Batman and the Joker and considers the ways in which they are actually
very similar, even though one is evil and the other is good. What
should also be considered are the many ways in which Batman and The
Joker are similar in terms of their own attitudes regarding autonomy
and their personal motivations involving retribution and justice.
The audience sees numerous circumstances in which it is possible to
see what each character thinks regarding wealth, culture, art, and
the rest of society, in general. No secondary sources. Filename: BWbatman.wps
(Summary from "Student Essays.")
Brooker, Will. Batman
Unmasked: Analyzing a Cultural Icon. Continuum Publishing. September
2001.
That's right . . . the
meaning of Batman. Brooker suggests that over the sixty years of his
existence, Batman has encountered an impressive array of cultural
icons and gradually become one himself. Pinpointing four key moments
in Batman's history, he examines the struggles over Batman's meaning
by shining a light on the cultural issues of the day. During the Second
World War, Batman refused to adapt to the patriotic propaganda of
the Second World War. In the mid-1950s, he was accused of corrupting
the youth of America by appearing to promote a homosexual lifestyle
to his fans. The sixties ABC TV series transformed him into a camp
pop culture icon. And, in recent years, Batman has been, once again,
re-interpreted by his fans in response to the comics and the Warner
Brothers franchise of films. Brooker's research has led him to challenge
many of the accepted notions of Batman's development as a character.
(Summary from Front
List).
". . . will appeal to
avid students of pop culture and comics, and a gay cult audience .
. . . Brooker's impressive overview of Batman's history reflects on
the masked one's origins, early arch rivals and the introduction of
Robin, and concentrates on four periods: WWII, the mid 1950s, the
'60s and the '90s. In 1954, child psychologist Fredric Wertham attacked
the comic book industry . . . noting homoerotic undercurrents between
Batman and Robin; Brooker's lengthy and fascinating gay reading .
. . supports Wertham's claim, albeit with a positive, postmodern twist.
After recalling the campy image of Batman spawned by ABC's 1960s TV
show, the author takes a look at Batman writers, fans, fanzines and
the Net, concluding with a hilarious chapter on how his research was
ridiculed by the British media."--Publishers Weekly
Johnson, Freya. "Holy
Homosexuality, Batman! Camp and Corporate Capitalism in Batman
Forever."
No summary available.
By Koscianski , Leonard.
WHAT IS CRITICAL POSTMODERN
ART? (2002)
The adult comic book artist
Charles Burns illustrates a very weird postmodern world of deformed
individuals in a dark urban landscape.(fig. 3) In a world where media
corporations expose us to a ceaseless avalanche of consumer products
and entertainment, Burns shows how this will effect who we are. These
are the human products of a consumer capitalist culture. As our senses
are constantly bombarded by pop commercial media...postmodern people
become strange creatures who begin to resemble the characters that
they watch everyday. Professional wrestlers like ³Hulk² Hogan and
³Mankind², Barney the dinosaur, Bugs Bunny, and Batman, are the cultural
figures that shape our sensibilities, our very selves. Burns has created
a frightening world of postmodern people. His images are the Goyaesque
depictions of the deformed inhabitants of a runaway consumer culture.
Kling, Bernt. "On
SF Comics: Some Notes for a Future Encyclopedia." Science
Fiction Studies #13 = Volume 4, Part 3. November 1977.
This essay surveys the
development of popular comics heroes from Buck Rogers and Flash Gordon
during the 1920s and 1930s to such contemporary superheroes as Superman
and his legion of imitators. While Superman is superior and stronger
in every respect, most of his colleagues are only specialists with
extreme, specialized gifts. Flash is the fastest man in the world;
Plastic Man can shape his body in any way. The Human Torch can transform
himself into a living flame; The Green Lantern draws his energy from
the energy of green light. A few heroes have in addition a mythological
background--The Mighty Thor, for instance. With many heroes we see
the totemistic use of an animal symbol: Spiderman, Batman, Hawkman.
With a few exceptions--notably, Denny OıNeilıs Green Lantern (particularly
between Nos.76-84), super-hero comics mainly dramatize violence against
stereotyped enemies. (Abstract from Science
Fiction Studies).
Leeper & Leeper.
"Nanotechnology and Clarke's Law." Michael A. Burstein,
Catherine Asaro, Glenn Grant (M), Daniel Hatch, Daniel P. Dern [written
by Mark R. Leeper]
"When Arthur C. Clarke
wrote that 'any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable
from magic,' he anticipated by thirty or forty years the explosion
of stories using nanotechnology. To what extent has nanotechnology
become a catch-all explanation for devices that border on the magical?
What techniques can be used to maintain a hard-SF feel in a story
with such miraculous gizmos?"... "What happens if there is some
failure in the design of nano-machines? Dern suggested that there
also would deliberate tinkering. He said that nanotechnology in fiction
has the same problem as the Batman utility belt problem. It simply
does too much. There is no problem it will not solve and no problem
in the design that you cannot get around. " (From Readercon
9 -- July 13, 1997 -- Part #3 A convention report by Evelyn C.
Leeper and Mark R. Leeper Copyright 1997 Evelyn C. Leeper and Mark
R. Leeper).
Leverenz, David. (1991).
"The Last Real Man in America: From Natty Bumppo to Batman."
American Literary Review, 3.
No summary available.
Medhurst, Andy. (1991).
Batman, Deviance, and Camp. In Pearson, Roberta E. and Uricchio, William.
(eds). The Many Lives of the Batman: Critical Approaches to a Superhero
and His Media. New York: Routledge.
No summary available.
Parsons, Patrick. "Batman
and his Audience: The Dialectic of Culture." The Many Lives of
the Batman: Critical Approaches to a Superhero and his Media.
Roberta Pearson and William Uricchio, eds. New York: Routledge Press,
1991.
By the early 1990's, Batman
texts were quite diverse, ranging from Frank Miller's The Dark Knight
Returns - a relatively sophisticated, grim story of psychosis and
cultural deterioration - to the popular Tim Burton movie, to merchandise
including children's pajamas and lunch boxes. Parsons finds in this
diversity a "distributed curve of meanings", and explores the nature
of the audience for Batman and for super-heroes in general. The exploration
begins with a statistically detailed historical overview. Parsons
traces a slow, steady decline in the size of comic book heroes' audience,
along with an increasing sophistication among those readers. Initially
popular, especially among children and soldiers in the 1940's, comic
book heroes aroused public suspicion in the 1950's, best represented
by Dr. Frederic Wertham. The advent of television cut directly into
comics readership, observes Parsons, citing a 1960 study of two Canadian
towns, one with television and one without. In the 1960's, the fan
movement brought new interest in super-heroes along with an older
readership. The establishment of the direct distribution system of
comics shops furthered this tendency. Finally, Parsons profiles the
comics readership of the early 1990's: a smaller group than in past
decades, considerably older (with a mean age of 18), often college-educated,
overwhelmingly male, and frequently with an academic or professional
interest in math, engineering, or science and an accompanying interest
in non-comic science fiction and fantasy literature. Nevertheless,
Batman and similar icons continue to hold the interest of children
and the broader culture, primarily through licensed merchandise and
other media; these forms offer meanings that contrast drastically
with the characters as portrayed in the comic books. Parsons describes
this process as one of interaction between two curves of cultural
meaning, one embedded in the audience and one embedded in the narrative
(Summary from "Geek
Culture").
Pearson, Roberta and
Uricchio, William, Eds. The
Many Lives of the Batman: Critical Approaches to a Superhero and his
Media.eds. New York: Routledge Press, 1991. Essays include:
"Holy Shifting Signifiers"
"Batman: Commodity as
Myth"
"`Holy Commodity Fetish,
Batman!': The Political Economy of a Commercial Interest"
"Batman and His Audience:
The Dialectic of Culture"
"Batman: The Ethnography"
"Same Bat Channel, Different
Bat Times: Mass Culture and Popular Memory"
"Batman, Deviance and
Camp" and "Batman: The Movie Narrative: The Hyperconscious"
Thomas, Calvin. (1999).
Last Laughs: Batman, Masculinity, and the Technology of Abjection.
Men and Masculinities, 2(1), July. (1999).
No summary available.
Sasha Torres. "The
Caped Crusader of Camp: Pop, Camp, and the Batman Television Series."
Camp: Queer Aesthetics and the Performing Subject. Fabio Cleto,
Ed. University of Michigan Press. 1999.
No summary available.
Wertham, Frederic. Seduction
of the Innocent. New York: Rinehart Press, 1954.
Notorious among comic book
fans, this book was part of psychiatrist Frederic Wertham's long campaign
against comic books as a cause of juvenile delinquency. This work
attacks comics on virtually every ground imaginable, declaring them
to cause violence, immorality, and illiteracy. More often than not,
Wertham's attacks seem like rationalization of an irrational hatred
of the medium. Much of his argument is anecdotal, citing juvenile
delinquents who read comic books as proof that comic books cause delinquency.
The work consistently ignores contextual distinctions between villains
and heroes, and between realistic and fantastic genres, citing every
violent action, no matter what its resolution, as a crime that children
will emulate. In recent years, some academics have come to Wertham's
partial defense as textual theories have increased recognition of
the subtle effects of text on an audience. This work's objections
to racist stereotypes are particularly sympathetic, and his objections
to violence in the media are not unlike the controversy that continues
today over video games, film, and television. In any event, this book
is worth consideration as a significant part of the history of comic
book culture, and as one of the first studies of comic book readers
as a group (Summary from "Geek
Culture").
The Many
Incarnations of Batman:
Batman Comic, Bob Kane
1939
Dark Knight, Frank Miller
1980s
TV Show with Adam West,
1960s
TV Cartoon (Superfriends),
late 1970s
(Image of
Batman & Robin in SUPERFRIENDS, taken from:http://www.yesterdayland.com/popopedia/memories/show_mem.php?ID=SA1012)
WB TV Cartoon (Same bat
time, same bat channel) 1990s
Movies (x4), with Michael
Keaton, Val Kilmer, and George Clooney, see the following link:
http://www.grudge-match.com/History/batmen.shtml
Batman's
History:
http://www.characterproducts.com/info/character_histories/batman_doorway.htm
http://nene.essortment.com/historybatman_rbjo.htm
http://www.angelfire.com/nm/m/Batman.html
Characters
and Villains in Batman's World:
Penguin
Joker
Robin
The Riddler
Catwoman
Image of Catwoman, taken
from: http://www.aboutcatwoman.com/cat1.html
Batman
in Other Cultures:
(Image of Batman Movie
Poster in Spanish. Taken from: http://www.batmanguiavisual.com/autores/entrevistas/carlos_luis.htm)
(Image taken from a French
Batman website:
http://www.cinopsis.be/batman&robin/historiq.htm)
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