Gender and Ethnicity in Comic Strips

Over time people of color have been degraded and dehumanized in many ways. In his 1973 book, "Comic Stripped", Arthur Berger refers to the early comic strip, Yellow Kid, whose "...world was that of tough, dirty little immigrant kids... There were Negro children, with kinky hair or thick white lips, Irish toughs, and mangy, ragged animals." (Berger, 27) "Babies and children permeate the cartoon and you get a sense that they are not really human; they are 'material' to be manipulated." (Berger, 30) "There is misspelling, which is a way of revealing ignorance and is part of the humor of ex…