Fun Home
========
Wolran Kim
December 2012
Alison Bechdel (1960~) is an American cartoonist and is originally best known for the long-running comic strip Dykes to Watch Out For. In 2006, she became a best-selling and critically acclaimed author with her graphic memoir Fun Home. She was born in Pennsylvania to Roman Catholic parents who were teachers and her family owned and operated a funeral home. Fun Home was a finalist for the 2006 National Book Critics Circle Award in the memoir/autobiography category. It also won the 2007 Eisner Award for Best Reality-Based Work. Fun Home was also nominated for the Best Graphic Album award, and Bechdel was nominated for Best Writer/Artist.
Titles often aim to highlight the contents through circumvented representation or such an opposed effect. So the contents of her fun home actually include much more tragic elements of a gay father and lesbian daughter. In 2006, Bechdel published Fun Home, an autobiographical "tragicomic" chronicling her childhood and the years before and after her father's death. Fun Home has received more widespread mainstream attention than Bechdel's earlier work, and spent two weeks on the New York Times Hardcover Nonfiction bestseller list. It was hailed as one of the best books of 2006 by numerous sources, including The New York Times, amazon.com, The Times of London, Publishers Weekly, salon.com, New York magazine, and Entertainment Weekly.
Fun Home has been both a popular and critical success and was positively reviewed in many publications. It has been the subject of numerous academic publications in areas such as biography studies and cultural studies, as part of a larger turn towards serious academic investment in the study of comics/sequential art. Fun Home also generated controversy: a public library in Missouri removed Fun Home from its shelves for five months after local residents objected to its contents. LGBT (Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) rights in the United States have evolved over time and vary on a state-by-state basis. Sexual acts between consenting adults and adolescents of a close age and of the same sex have been legal nationwide in the U.S. since 2003. Twenty-one states outlaw discrimination based on sexual orientation, and sixteen states outlaw discrimination based on gender identity or expression.
In September 2005, the California state legislators passed a same sex marriage bill but each time it was vetoed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. This is the first time a state legislator passed a same sex marriage bill. In June 2005, the California state legislators passed a same sex marriage bill. Same sex marriages performed after November 5, 2008 are recognized in California with all of the legal rights of marriage but without the use of the word marriage. As of January 2010, 29 states had constitutional provisions restricting marriage to one man and one woman, while 12 others had laws that did so. Nineteen states ban any legal recognition of same-sex unions that would be equivalent to civil marriage. In June 2011, two prominent polling organizations released an analysis of the changing trend in public opinion about same-sex marriage in the United States, concluding that "public support for the freedom to marry has increased, at an accelerating rate, with most polls showing that a majority of Americans now support full marriage rights for all Americans."
A March 2011 public opinion poll by ABC News/Washington Post showed support for gay marriage at 53% among Americans. The main supports of gay rights in the U.S. have generally been political liberals. Regionally, support for the gay rights movement has been strongest in the North coast and West coast and in other states with a large urban population. 3-7% of LGBT is not a small percentage and could be part of my family and friends. Bechdel’s tragicomic cartoon gives us a chance to reflect about sexual orientation, gender roles and identity, dysfunctional families, and suicide.
Some people believe that people are gay because the mother experiences a traumatic event while pregnant, thus causing some kind of chemical imbalance in the child. Others believe it is a genetic trait, passed through our DNA. While others think that it is a choice by the individual after they are born. In the case of Alison Bechdel, the author of Fun Home, it is reasonable to state that her family life, particularly her relationship with her parents, caused or at least had some effect on her sexuality. Eventually, Alison realizes that although she did not have a conventional dad or a close relationship with him, she was fortunate to have Bruce as her father, because he helped her through her process of self-identity. Maybe the more important point is not why or what made Alison gay, but that her dad was there to father her when she needed him most.
I remember that there was at least one girl who acted like a boy in my junior high and high school classes. There was one woman who wore men’s clothes and lived with a woman in my neighborhood also. I used to think they are born like that because we only have two opposite sexes, so I wondered why they are not born between them. I think they are born like that just like people are born with natural skin colors. They are the same as having physical disabilities and we should accept them as natural, not abnormal or unusual. Walter Williams’ view of Berdachism has persuasive power, “If nature makes a person different ... a mere human should not undertake to counter this spiritual dictate. ... Berdachism is thus not alien or threatening; it is a reflection of spirituality.”
========
Wolran Kim
December 2012
Alison Bechdel (1960~) is an American cartoonist and is originally best known for the long-running comic strip Dykes to Watch Out For. In 2006, she became a best-selling and critically acclaimed author with her graphic memoir Fun Home. She was born in Pennsylvania to Roman Catholic parents who were teachers and her family owned and operated a funeral home. Fun Home was a finalist for the 2006 National Book Critics Circle Award in the memoir/autobiography category. It also won the 2007 Eisner Award for Best Reality-Based Work. Fun Home was also nominated for the Best Graphic Album award, and Bechdel was nominated for Best Writer/Artist.
Titles often aim to highlight the contents through circumvented representation or such an opposed effect. So the contents of her fun home actually include much more tragic elements of a gay father and lesbian daughter. In 2006, Bechdel published Fun Home, an autobiographical "tragicomic" chronicling her childhood and the years before and after her father's death. Fun Home has received more widespread mainstream attention than Bechdel's earlier work, and spent two weeks on the New York Times Hardcover Nonfiction bestseller list. It was hailed as one of the best books of 2006 by numerous sources, including The New York Times, amazon.com, The Times of London, Publishers Weekly, salon.com, New York magazine, and Entertainment Weekly.
Fun Home has been both a popular and critical success and was positively reviewed in many publications. It has been the subject of numerous academic publications in areas such as biography studies and cultural studies, as part of a larger turn towards serious academic investment in the study of comics/sequential art. Fun Home also generated controversy: a public library in Missouri removed Fun Home from its shelves for five months after local residents objected to its contents. LGBT (Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) rights in the United States have evolved over time and vary on a state-by-state basis. Sexual acts between consenting adults and adolescents of a close age and of the same sex have been legal nationwide in the U.S. since 2003. Twenty-one states outlaw discrimination based on sexual orientation, and sixteen states outlaw discrimination based on gender identity or expression.
In September 2005, the California state legislators passed a same sex marriage bill but each time it was vetoed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. This is the first time a state legislator passed a same sex marriage bill. In June 2005, the California state legislators passed a same sex marriage bill. Same sex marriages performed after November 5, 2008 are recognized in California with all of the legal rights of marriage but without the use of the word marriage. As of January 2010, 29 states had constitutional provisions restricting marriage to one man and one woman, while 12 others had laws that did so. Nineteen states ban any legal recognition of same-sex unions that would be equivalent to civil marriage. In June 2011, two prominent polling organizations released an analysis of the changing trend in public opinion about same-sex marriage in the United States, concluding that "public support for the freedom to marry has increased, at an accelerating rate, with most polls showing that a majority of Americans now support full marriage rights for all Americans."
A March 2011 public opinion poll by ABC News/Washington Post showed support for gay marriage at 53% among Americans. The main supports of gay rights in the U.S. have generally been political liberals. Regionally, support for the gay rights movement has been strongest in the North coast and West coast and in other states with a large urban population. 3-7% of LGBT is not a small percentage and could be part of my family and friends. Bechdel’s tragicomic cartoon gives us a chance to reflect about sexual orientation, gender roles and identity, dysfunctional families, and suicide.
Some people believe that people are gay because the mother experiences a traumatic event while pregnant, thus causing some kind of chemical imbalance in the child. Others believe it is a genetic trait, passed through our DNA. While others think that it is a choice by the individual after they are born. In the case of Alison Bechdel, the author of Fun Home, it is reasonable to state that her family life, particularly her relationship with her parents, caused or at least had some effect on her sexuality. Eventually, Alison realizes that although she did not have a conventional dad or a close relationship with him, she was fortunate to have Bruce as her father, because he helped her through her process of self-identity. Maybe the more important point is not why or what made Alison gay, but that her dad was there to father her when she needed him most.
I remember that there was at least one girl who acted like a boy in my junior high and high school classes. There was one woman who wore men’s clothes and lived with a woman in my neighborhood also. I used to think they are born like that because we only have two opposite sexes, so I wondered why they are not born between them. I think they are born like that just like people are born with natural skin colors. They are the same as having physical disabilities and we should accept them as natural, not abnormal or unusual. Walter Williams’ view of Berdachism has persuasive power, “If nature makes a person different ... a mere human should not undertake to counter this spiritual dictate. ... Berdachism is thus not alien or threatening; it is a reflection of spirituality.”
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