week 8: stereotype and the ethics of representation

As an animation student, the stereotype is definitely a serious problem we need to deal with. Since the target group for animated films is always normal people who don't understand how to design a character, it is very hard to not only avoid stereotypes but also make them understand. For example, if I need a ballet dancer in my animation, the first character design I can think about is a skinny blond white girl wearing a ballet dress. This is definitely a stereotype, but this is also the character design most people will understand. Because normal people usually don't understand ballet dancers. They don't know dancers need a lot of muscles and they don't know when they practice, they actually wear soft pants. It is the filmmaker's and animators' duty to explain this to the audience. So if you want to avoid stereotypes, you could design a muscular black dancer, but you need to set up the story and give it a good reason. You need to teach the audience about that. However, there are many animation shorts, which don't have enough time to do the explanation. For them, using stereotypes is actually a good idea.

For myself, I am always affected by stereotypes. For example, people still think Asian parents are very strict about grades. I think that's true. Most Asian parents are strict and that is a huge problem all Asian kids have. So I actually don't consider it is a bad stereotype. I think as long as you do some research and understand what the truth is, it is okay to have stereotypes.

Week 7: Spiegelman's Complete Maus

This week I read Maus by Art Spiegelman. This comic is about war and death, family and friends, father and son. The story is told through the interview between the father and the son. The story goes through the whole life of the father. I really enjoy reading this story through the father's POV. At the beginning of the story, I felt the character in his story is so different from himself in reality. I think the author is really clever to mix the real-life and the story together. After reading more about the story, I start to see the similarities between father and the young handsome man. 

In the story, this young man is ambitious and energetic. He is very confident to do anything. He wants to build his own business and family. He wants to show himself off to the girl he loves. But I can also see how irresponsible he is. He didn't refuse Lucia when she showed her love to him. Even after he started a relationship with the author's mom, he still didn't reject her completely. In the real-life, the father is the same person. He blamed Wala for a lot of things. He always gives orders and never wants to obey. When the author dropped cigarette ashes on the carpet, he was very angry and started giving orders. 

I also really like how the author depicts the war. He mixed the real-life and the stories together. So the audience can see how the war changed father obviously. He was ordered and tortured by soldiers. But now he threw his son's coat. He started to force other people to follow his orders. He was changed by the war. 

When the author depicted his father, I think he wanted to create a real human. So he gave his father bad temper and personality. But he also described how his father cared about his family, how clever he was and how brave he was. All these things make him look more like a human. I think why this book is so attractive.