Bande dessinée franco-belge et imaginaire colonial : des années 1930 aux années 1980 [Franco-Belgian Comics and Colonial Imagination: From the 1930s to the 1980s] by Philippe Delisle (review)

In many European countries, former colonies have given rise to a large number of literary, pictorial, or cinematographic works. Philippe Delisle, a historian specializing in the religious history of the colonies and a comic afficionado, investigates the ways in which Belgian comics (which quickly became known as Franco-Belgian comics) in their early days helped in the development of the colonial imagination and in strengthening its prejudices. The corpus he examines consists of around sixty titles published in magazines, such as Spirou or Tintin, and sometimes even in books—some of which are still in print today.

The natives have traditionally been described in a negative way—savages with enormous lips, ferocious cannibals, deceitful and cruel Asians, Arab looters, etc.—or in a very paternalistic way, with the constant stereotype of the black person as a lazy and naïve child who should be educated and who can only serve Westerners. In Tintin au Congo, published for the first time in 1930, all the black characters speak the same "petit nègre" (pidgin French) jargon, even in the revised edition of 1946.

The whites are all born leaders and saviours (with the exception of some baddies who are often Americans): well-wishing farmers, courageous explorers, and brave camel riders popping up from behind the dunes to save the hero. Throughout the decades, these stereotypes remain unchallenged, but a clear evolution can be noticed in the 1950s due to the influence of Catholic circles: the vision becomes less caricaturised and more fraternal (see the character of Tchang in Le Lotus bleu by Hergé, which was rather ahead of its time since the book was published in 1936). The "natives" become the heroes of some adventures. Africa and the Maghreb, the regions that are predominately mentioned in these works, finally cease to be considered barbaric lands saved by the "civilizing" mission of colonization.

Starting in the 1970s, openly anti-colonialist texts begin to emerge, with historical series based on solid documentation, such as Les Passagers du vent by François Bourgeon or Carnets d'Orient by Jacques Ferrandez, but also less realistic works such as Alice et Léopold by Denis Lapière and Olivier Wozniak, and certain episodes of Jimmy Tousseul by Daniel Desorgher and Stephen Desberg.