Reviews for Bad Language, Naked Ladies, and Other Threats to the Nation: A Political History of Comic Books in Mexico

The average rating for Bad Language, Naked Ladies, and Other Threats to the Nation: A Political History of Comic Books in Mexico based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2012-11-27 00:00:00 Mark Cross Culture is both a product of and a catalyst for social norms, and cultural relics ' even those as seemingly insignificant as comic books ' are valuable tools with which to analyze society. With that in mind, Anne Rubenstein, in her book Bad Language, Naked Ladies, & Other Threats to the Nation, explains the colorful significance of Mexico's "little stories" on the country's political history. By examining them as small frames within the larger tapestry of Mexican history and politics, Rubenstein highlights the larger issues that have arisen in Mexican culture over the past seven decades, and she argues that the people who took part in discussions about comic books justifiably felt that they were fighting in "a conflict over the fate of their families and their nation." Through her evidence and analysis, she presents a clear case for the importance of comic books in shaping many aspects of postrevolutionary Mexico. Rubenstein sets out to prove that critical analysis of comic books throughout 20th-century Mexico yields more than just "generic repetitions of stories that have long since grown tired," because the historietas afford a glimpse of "how the ultimate victors of the revolution transformed their faction into both a government and the idea of a nation." Anthropologists have come up with many different ways of studying postrevolutionary Mexico, sometimes going so far as to question the existence of a Mexican national culture. Rubenstein argues that there was indeed a single national culture, but that it was rooted in two different discourses: modernity and tradition. The struggle between tradition and modernity ingrained itself in Mexican society at least since the time of Benito Juarez, and the Porfiriato was deeply involved in the years leading up to the Revolution. Rubenstein argues that, even though "commentators assumed that comic books … must be a modernizing force," they consistently utilized "the words, veiled assumptions and values of 'tradition.'" "New technology," and specifically "new forms of transportation" were prominent in comic books, but traditional "questions of character and morality within marriage" were vital to readers. The role of women also had a distinct role in the debate. The contrast between the stereotypical traditional woman, who "stayed at home, preferably in rural areas," and the urban, working, sexualized chica moderna was pivotal in understanding the traditional/modern discourse. Comic books presented a Mexico that idealized both the past and the future. Comic books did not strongly favor tradition over modernity or modernity over tradition, and in that balance, they reflected Mexican society. But some of the arguments against comic books were rooted in that most traditional and conservative part of Mexican life - the Catholic church. Beginning in 1933, the Legion of Decency, an organization sponsored by the archdiocese of Mexico City, argued that "comic books had to be controlled by the state" because "readers might sympathize with [some] of the sinning characters." The Legion of Decency warned its followers about movies that could be conceived as morally repugnant, but it went a step further with comic books and calling for government censorship of the historietas. Comic books were a hotbed for conservative criticism of modernity and the many changes that came with it. Criticism was marked by a wide variety of issues: "the connection between education and immorality, the especially sexual nature of comic books, the danger posed to children, the link between comic books and crime, the substitution of complaints about mass media for complaints about education, the demand for stronger action by the state, and the perceived relation between mass media and national weakness." La Comisíon Calificadora de Publicaciones y Revistas Ilustradas was the state's answer to calls for censorship. Created in 1944, it was largely without the funding or power it World have needed to be successful in censoring comic books, and for nine years, the men and women hired to police the morality of Mexican publications didn't even get their salaries. The commission did, however, ensure that the Mexican government a "central, mediating position" in the dialogue "between modernists and traditionalists over mass media, popular culture, and national identity." It flourished in filling roles that were not explicitly assigned to it, and it "absorbed the fury and distracted the attentions of some politically organized social conservatives." The Commission is a striking example of the way the priista Mexican government co-opted extremists in the name of stability. It appeased conservatives in more than one way by hiring commissioners "less for their devotion to the hard work of setting up a new bureaucracy than for their public reputation for morality." Rubenstein uses a loosely chronological structure to frame her history of comic books, and her arguments are well-founded. The fact that she has included specific samples - both through her own description and in graphic form between chapters - both makes the book more readable and her assertions more salient. The actual advertisements and stories that filled the historietas are essential to the reader's understanding of the concepts Rubenstein puts forth, and their inclusion allows readers to see for themselves some of the evidence Rubenstein has compiled. Throughout the book, she contends that comic books were more than superheroes and melodrama in the Mexico Miracle Years, and important cultural battles were being fought over their content and existence. As a battleground for traditionalists and modernists, comic books walked the line between glorifying and vilifying change, but more importantly, they fostered a debate that helped Mexico find stability in the shadow of the Revolution.

Review # 2 was written on 2008-04-19 00:00:00 Todd Megna It's not like theres some minor flaws in this book, theres like plenty of completely wrong stuff inside! Like the Blade Runner Part, where Dr. Tyrell was killed by falling from the rooftop of a cathedral?!? And the research is poor. This "detective story" about the missing de Piles Quotation on pastiche is the lamest thing I ever heard. Took maybe 5 minutes to find it.