More Latin American Stereotypes Than You Can Shake a Stick At... #mextasy #textmex @eyegiene

I love Pappy's comics blog--one of the best in the biz!  And I love the treasure trove of stuff he unearths and shares; with or without knowing it, he has curated one of the best short histories of Latina/o representation available on the net!  A grand tip of the sombrero to Pappy!

Here's his latest find!  Click the image for the entire story:

Pre-Halloween Textmex Treat: Vampire Edition | Tales of the Ghost Rider: "A Thirst for Blood" | via Pappy's Golden Age Comics Blogzine

One of the best comics blogs on the internets, Pappy's Golden Age Comics Blogzine keeps on churning out wonders from the history of graphic narrative. This one's a hoot, featuring a rich güera vampiress by the name of Isabella de Alva Riacomba, a Latina (Creole?) vixen out for riches, blood, revenge, and more blood--hit the image above to read the whole sordid tale.

Wow! Mexican Pulp Fiction | via boingboing.net

Click the image above for the motherload.... my faves appear below:

The Tex[t]-Mex Semiotic Composite For the Day! The graphic novel adventures of a gunslingin' güero tonto—muchas piernas, balas, y pistolas.

warning! not for those earnestly
ensconced in a nunnery or monastery!

original posting, here...

Superman Saves The Barrio For the United Farmworkers Union: Cesar Chavez's Buddy in Tights!

original posting: 9/26/07

Growing up in Laredo, ensconced in my room with Snoopy posters and UT Longhorn banners, I always thrilled to the wonders of Curt Swan and Murphy Anderson's Superman stories for DC comics. Little did I know that one of these wonders--January 1972, issue 247--featured the Man of Steel as a defender of Mexican Farm Workers. Small World.

A former student of mine and regular Tex[t]-Mex Galleryblog contributor, Professor Marc García-Martinez, of Hancock College, writes in with this comic book, blast-from-the-past, skinny:

At the end of the tumultuous 60’s decade TIME magazine featured Cesar Chavez on its famous cover and a timely story on “The Grapes of Wrath, 1969: Mexican-Americans on the March.”

At the beginning of 1980 National Geographic, that distinguished magazine devoted to all things natural and cultural, featured an honest piece on “Mexican-Americans: A People on the Move.”

Somewhere in between, circa 1972, DC comics contributed its own unique brand of homage to La Raza by presenting an peculiar tale in its Superman No. 247 that could have justly been called “Mexican-Americans: Idle Farm Workers on Attack.”

Featuring in the relative climax of the story an assortment of Mexican-[ergo geographically-laborious-American] farm workers in California’s central valley, the story is an ironic and curious little portrait of the Mexican, that seems to cut too close to the spineless, indolent, leech-off-the-government for aid portrayals we’ve seen all too often lately.

This is some strange verbal-visual caca here, carnal…perhaps inadvertent. Let’s chat about this some more!

En la lucha,

Marc

García-Martinez also forwarded cool scans from the story; I would appreciate it if anyone has issue 272, as it is, oddly, missing from my collection. I'll offer a free copy of Tex[t]-Mex to the first person to email me at memo@sdsu.edu to let me know you are willing to loan or give me this prized issue!
























update

Professor García-Martinez just gave me the headsup on a Mexico City, Spanish-language edition of this story! I just bought it off ebay. Abrazos a mi amigo en Hancock College.

ChicanOsmosis/XicanOsmosis Jaime Hernandez Style: The Origins of a Graphic Narrative Genius in His Own Words

Gracias to Daniel Hernandez for tipping my eyes to this cool brief chat with Love and Rockets maestro Jaime Hernandez. Hit the image, left, for the linkaso.

UPDATE: Frederick Aldama's New Book with UT Press! Your Brain on Latino Comics!

original post: 1/16/09


More soon on this ultra cool new volume from the University of Texas Press (yes, I am utterly and unapologetically biased!) by the one and only Frederick Luis Aldama! The EC-comics style cover, circa 1953, is amazing--however, as I told Aldama, I would have preferred Gilbert Hernandez's Tonantzín (right) or Luba (!) on the front cover.

Here's the blurb I wrote for the back cover after sneaking a long, longing read of its pages:

“‘Holy funny pages, Batman!’ Fred Aldama’s Your Brain on Latino Comics tears open new tierra as its savvy x-ray vision parses Latino visual culture. With voracious eyes attuned to word-image conspiracies, grandmaster Aldama’s ink-stained hands reveal the legacy and destiny of ‘American’ comics. This is a go-to book for profs in ethnic/cultural studies and communications. Jump into a phone booth and reach for your hot spandex tights—Aldama’s lush, semiotic alchemy will have you leaping buildings in a single bound!”
—William A. Nericcio, Chair, English and Comparative Literature, San Diego State University; Visiting Professor, Media and Cultural Studies, University of California, Riverside

update

Here's a scan of the back cover:

Cool Lucha Libre Graphic on FFFFound.com

original posting: 1/13/09 @ 1:49pm


Gracias to "anonymous" for the i.d. of the Blue Demon!

update 3/16/09

...and a shout-out to alexis ziritt, the artist, who has just checked in with a credit! nice work!

Luba as Wonder Woman

Just a quick flash of Gilbert Hernandez's genius--a depiction of Luba as Wonder Woman; part of a project you can see here.

Ilan Stavans Goes to Bat on Mr. Spic Goes to Washington

There's a new blog in town and it's already tipped me to something off my radar but right on target for Tex[t]-Mex: Ilan Stavans' new book, Mr. Spic Goes to Washington.

source: tejaztlan.wordpress.com

Comic-Con, San Diego, Pablo Jaime Sáinz, and Latinos in Graphic Narrative

Just getting around to scanning a nice piece on Latinas/os in the world of comic books that Pablo Jaime Sáinz had in Enlace, the Spanish-language version of the Union-Tribune newspaper here in San Diego around this time last year; the piece is in Spanish and features great graphics and writing!


Blogger saved the image smaller, so here is more readable copy:

The Chicano Gods of Our American Graphic Narrative Renaissance!

An amazing online assemblage courtesy KCET's web-stories! Sublime.



debts to be paid? but of course: