Hello readers,

For the past week in my ASTU 100 class, we have been reading a graphic narrative titled Persepolis, by Marjane Satrapi. This graphic narrative reveals the life of Marji, a young girl growing up in Iran amid the Iranian Islamic Revolution and the Iran-Iraq War. When first being introduced to this book, I was surprised that I would be reading a comic book in university, however the surprise instantly turned into excitement due to my love of manga; which is the Japanese version of comic books.

When I read about the Revolution and the War in Persepolis, I instantly connected it to a manga that  has a parallel plot line titled Hakuouki Shisengumi Kitan. In this historical manga, a revolution and war is also happening. In Japan during the mid-1800s, the Shisengumi (the main protagonist group) sides with the old government wishing to preserve the old ways while the Imperialists wish for change in the government and ultimately these two sides go to war. Having connected these two texts, I again connected these texts to an essay that I have read in my ASTU class as well. Farhat Shahzad, an educational scholar cites Wertsch, an anthropologist, who states that “remembering and learning involve[s] a process of mediation between two main forces”, which the ‘human agent’ and ‘technologies of memory’ help the human agent learn and remember things which they have not experienced. In my case, I have not experienced the Iranian Islamic Revolution, the Iran-Iraq War and the Meiji Revolution. However by reading Persepolis and Hakuouki Shisengumi Kitan, the memories of these events have been passed onto me and I have learned about these events from them.

Like manga, by portraying the story in a comic book style, Satrapi has made it easy for the reader to easily digest the information coming from the speech bubbles all the while looking at the stark, simple black and white images which show the story through the eyes Marji.

Works cited:

Article:

Shahzad, Farhat. “The Role of Interpretive Communities in Remembering and Learning.”Canadian Journal of Education 34.3 (2011): 301-316. Web. ProQuest. 28 Sept. 2015.