Postcolonialism and Migration in French Comics by Mark McKinney

Abstract

Reviewed by: Postcolonialism and Migration in French Comics by Mark McKinney Benjamin Sparks McKinney, Mark. Postcolonialism and Migration in French Comics. Leuven UP, 2021 ISBN 978-94-6270-241-7. Pp. 399. Comics as a form of popular culture derive from highly influential cartoonists like Hergé and Saint-Ogan, whose works were foundational to the ninth art. Colonialism played a significant role in these cartoonists’ works and inspired the development of this art form in aesthetics, genre, and serialization. Evidence of colonialism’s role in the works of Hergé is displayed in his depiction of Africans in Tintin au Congo and his critique of communism in Tintin au pays des Soviets, wherein he openly disseminates far-right ideologies. McKinney’s previous works, The Colonial Heritage of French Comics (FR 86.2) and Redrawing French Empire in Comics (FR 88.1), discuss the colonial themes of comics, including an emphasis on Indochina and Algeria. This work focuses on the postcolonial era in France since the end of the Algerian War, focusing on migration and postcolonial ethnic minorities. McKinney begins by creating a historical framework for understanding the transition in comics toward the postcolonial with cartoonists like Mœbius, who transformed the field with a new realistic approach in his socially engaged Cauchemar blanc. This work ushered in a tradition of antiracist, postcolonial comics through reworkings of his pivotal comic by future generations. McKinney then looks at major artists through a dialogical approach to analyze the mutation from colonial to postcolonial, emphasizing ethnic minorities and migration. Arguing that postcolonialism and migration have played a more significant role in these new realist comics than previously acknowledged, McKinney then considers the comics of Boudjellal and the role of migration of Algerians to France in his works. The following chapter examines pastiche and working-class migration in the comics of Baru. McKinney moves on from counter narratives of Mœbius’s work to the concept of citadel culture formulated by Werckmeister to understand the relationship between poor ethnic minorities and wealthier white inner-cities. Continuing the analysis of ethnic minorities, the author looks at how far-right cartoonists represent these migrants and foreigners in France with an example of Chard and Faye, whose comics satirize the attempted assassination of Jacques Chirac by a far-right activist in Chirac contre les fachos. McKinney argues that this and other far-right comics provide a helpful window into the ideologies of this group in France today. The author also looks at avant-gardism and how art and comics engage with the issues of postcolonial minorities. This work ends with an analysis of the situation of les sans-papiers and their representation in comics, drawing attention to their condition in order to humanize and gather support for them and to discourage governmental repressive anti-migrant policing. This is an engaging text for all readers interested in French comics. [End Page 232] Benjamin Sparks University of Memphis (TN) Copyright © 2022 American Association of Teachers of French