Wikipedia Trail - From 'Comics' to 'Kamishibai'

Wikipedia Trail

So due to a missed reading assignment, I had to use an extra task to make up for the lost points.

I started this Wikipedia trail from Comics first.

On this page it talked about what kind of medium comics are, its history throughout the world, the many artstyles etc.

Since comics came up, I knew that manga would definitely be in the article. And I was completely right! Next it was the history of manga.

Manga is essentially just Japanese comics, but its conception from the very beginning of its history and its eventual development made it so unique that people nowadays consider the western comics and Japanese manga to be entirely separate. It had history based from since in the 17th century but the time where it had the most drastic change and development was after World War 2, during the occupation (1945-1952) and the post occupation years (1952-early 1960s).

It was a very interesting read. Next I found the history of anime because well, it was on the same page so I assumed: why not?

Anime is essentially any show that has been shown using animation. Yes that includes 'cartoons' because in the Japanese dictionary, the word 'cartoon' doesn't exist and is substituted by the more accessible term 'Anime'.

Anime has its origins as early as the early 1900s. The article goes through the decades in Anime's history where we see the many changes in the industry, artstyles, trends etc.

After reading I found an interesting article on an old form of storytelling on the article called:

'Kamishibai'.

Kamishibai is a form of Japanese of street theatre and storytelling that was quite popular in the 1930 Depression and post-war period in Japan before the introduction of television later on. The story will be displayed using images slotted into a stage-like device while the narrator tells the story to the audience.

Image link
A kamishibai artist performing in Tokyo.

I found this simplistic yet interesting form of storytelling to be reminiscent of puppet shows. It was a great early rendition in trying to combine picture and text to tell a story.