As you go through your research, I will do the project with you. Over the next four weeks, I will update this page with new texts that I find over the course of my research, so you can see how I put my project together.

Week One: Finding Your First Text

Monday, January 25

To start my research, I found a book called The Astro Boy Essays by Frederik L. Schodt. In the chapter "A Medley of Messages," he discusses a newspaper article Osamu Tezuka (the creator of Astro Boy, known as Mighty Atom in Japan) wrote in 1967.

"Tezuka explained that Mighty Atom was really about the chasmic misunderstandings and problems that might occur between man and robot in the future. 'I never intended,' he wrote, 'to create a story set in the twenty-first century about a glorious scientific civilization.' He was, instead, inspired by his frustrating and humiliating experience at the end of the war, of having been beaten by a group of GIs because he could not communicate effectively with them in English. As he would write in seemingly countless other articles, Mighty Atom was about discrimination" (Schodt 121).

This quote inspired me to look for Astro Boy comics that serve as metaphors for social issues. I chose:

Text # 1: "Plant People" in Astro Boy Omnibus

I read through a few options, but I settled on this comic because its themes of environmentalism and discrimination feel representative of the messages Tezuka was trying to get across in his work.

Because I am a novice to analyzing comic strips, I also started reading a book called Understanding Comics, which helps the reader analyze comics the way a reader might analyze a novel or poem. It doesn't have anything to do with Japan, but it will help me understand how authors create meaning in the comic genre through both words and images.

I added these texts to my annotated bibliography.

After reading "Plant People," I wrote an analysis paragraph explaining how this text serves as a window to the other stories of my chosen culture as well as a mirror to universal human themes: Wallace Text 1 Paragraph.docx

Week Two: Finding Your Second Text

Monday, February 1

Last week, I read Astro Boy comics. I was surprised to learn that Astro Boy was intended as a metaphor for post-nuclear anxiety in Japanese culture. He represents the futuristic hope of technology but also technology's potential to cause mass destruction.

I decided to pursue that thread for my second text. Instead of reading another manga, I found another text featuring a metaphor for Japan's post-nuclear anxiety and fears...

Text #2: I watched the original 1954 Godzilla

I also read an article (Links to an external site.) by J. Hoberman called "Godzilla: Poetry After the A-Bomb" about how the movie was received by Japanese audiences, especially the nuclear elements of the plot:

“Godzilla was a way to imaginatively portray—and even exorcise—not just the atomic attack but also World War II in general, and to assuage more contemporary nuclear fears. As noted by Japanese film critic Toyomasa Kobayashi, recent anxieties were a factor in the movie’s appeal: 'For people finally experiencing economic recovery after a war that decimated the country to burnt land, the spectacle of Gojira’s urban destruction was exceedingly realistic. Without doubt, this was one of its major charms.'"

My second text furthered my understanding of post-war Japanese culture by showing how their experience of nuclear bombs informed their popular entertainment.

After watching the film and reading the article, I wrote a paragraph about how the film serves as a window to understanding Japanese culture while also serving as a mirror to how I relate to the text: Wallace Text 2 Paragraph.docx

I updated my bibliography: Wallace Annotated Bibliography Week Two.docx

Week Three: Putting Together My Showcase

Monday, February 8

Now that I have my two texts, I began to put together my showcase of the learning.

Step One: Determine What You Want to Create

I knew that I wanted to use comic-style illustrations in my presentations, inspired by my first text, Astro Boy. I thought about drawing a comic strip myself, but I am not a very good artist and I worried it would take too long. I decided to use the online comic creator Pixton (Links to an external site.) to create my panels and put them into a PowerPoint, which I would then make into a video using the Screencastify (Links to an external site.) Chrome extension,

Step Two: Create a Plan

I wrote a script of what I wanted to say about each text. I used some of what I wrote in my analysis paragraphs, but added quotes from other articles I read about my topic and tried to make more connections between the texts in my analysis.

Then, I created my Pixton comic book panels, portioning out my script into different panels. I used the free version of Pixton, so I was somewhat limited in how creative I could be with my backgrounds, which was frustrating. I'm not sure I would give myself full marks on the "Visually Creative" section of the rubric: World Tour Showcase Rubric.docx

Step Three: Determine What Else You Need

As I was putting together my script and PowerPoint, I realized that I didn't say much about the "single story" of Japanese culture I was trying to expand. One of the interesting things about Godzilla is the way the imagery of the monster attacking Tokyo deliberately evokes images of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the aftermath, to a degree bordering on tastelessness. It seemed strange to me that audiences and readers of Godzilla and Astro Boy were so willing to be entertained by themes of nuclear destruction not ten years after WWII.

I decided to find two more texts: a video and a poem. I wanted the video (Links to an external site.) to show images of the aftermath of the Hiroshima bombing in a way that mirrored the images of destruction in Godzilla and I wanted to find a poem (Links to an external site.) about the bombing that highlighted the very real human toll and trauma of the event, in a way that established the "single story" I had about the Japanese mindset.

Step Four: Create Your Showcase!

Things I had to consider

Am I providing enough background info for outsiders to understand my topic?
Am I CLEARLY distinguishing between material that I am quoting and material that I myself created to AVOID PLAGIARISM?
Does my product look (relatively) neat and tidy?
Where would my project fall on the rubric ?

Here is the finished product! It's not perfect, but I had a lot of fun discovering my texts and learning about my topic.

Post-War Japan Showcase.mp4Wallace Annotated Bibliography-2.docx