Comics as tools for teaching and transmitting knowledge about history and heritage

Abstract

While certain popular narrative genres, such as traditional tales, epic poems, and fables were historically created following a didactic and moralizing purpose, this function is relatively recent in comics, a typical phenomenon of urban-industrial societies. Its origins, which can be associated to mass entertainment companies, deeply marked the legitimacy and cultural status of comic books. However, in recent decades, comics have begun to break free of these limits and have become a tool for teaching and transmitting knowledge, even at higher education, through the emergence of scientific books and even doctoral theses produced in graphic novel format. In this paper, we aim at problematizing the use of the language and resources of comics as a vehicle for the teaching and transmission of heritage and cultural baggage. To do so, we will be using the theoretical tools of well-known scholars of the ninth art, such as the American researcher and artist Scott McCloud and the Italian Daniele Barbieri, as well as those of more recent authors, such as the Argentineans Lucas Berone and Federico Reggiani, among others. Our intention is to put into dialogue the theoretical concepts postulated by different researchers, as opposed to the concrete experience gained in the elaboration of ¿Cómo era... la Ciudad de San Luis en la Época Colonial?, reference material produced within the framework of the research project "Memorias y Prácticas Educativas" (FCH-UNSL), whose ultimate goal was to produce teaching tools to be used at different levels of the educational system in San Luis.