Alex Mikolajko

Writing Seminar
Rhetorical Source Analysis (RSA)
Daliot-Bul writes an article, Reframing and reconsidering the cultural innovations of the
anime boom on US television, for the International Journal of Cultural Studies on his reasoning
behind the anime boom that the United States has experienced in the 1990s and early 2000s. To
better understand the boom in Japanese anime, the author starts at the birth of anime in the
1960s and follows its transition to television broadcasting in the United States. He mostly
focuses on the 1990s and the reasoning behind the unexpected popularity of already aired anime
series and the effect it had on cartoons through inspiration and culture. Daliot-Bul argues that
animes inspiration upon US cartoon series lead to the inevitable end of the anime boom because
of innovations within the field of animation eventually became industrys mainstay.
Daliot-Bul referenced to Lamarre Thomass book, Anime Machine: A Media Theory of
Animation, when talking about the creation of anime and the effects it had on cartoons in the
1960s and 70s. The author shows an example of countering when he argues that Lamarre
Thomass statement of how anime in Japan was defeated due to western civilizations twist on it
during the 1990s was misleading. Daliot-Bul believed that Thomas ignored a crucial fact when
Thomas overlooked the marketing and expansion of culture within anime was a huge success for
the country of Japan. Daliot-Bul wording and citation on this argument of his paper was rough if
one were to dig deeper. Thomass book on anime is more over based on facts rather than
opinions. The referenced page that Daliot-Bul cited was only chapter notes referring to chapter
twelve. Daliot-Buls true argument was with Okada Toshio, a Japanese animator, that showed

concern with western subcultures. In the 1990s Toshio drew a picture of a mushroom cloud with
the defeat of Japan written underneath it illustrating that anime is no longer specific to Japan.
Daliot-Buls wording was also slightly off when mentioning animes Japaneseness, which is a
bit childish. As for the counter itself, Daliot-Buls argument is feasible by stating that Japan
animators may have been exaggerating rather than looking at the big picture since anime is still
correlated with Japan culture as well as had a successful impact on western society.
Daliot-Bul starts to go into the strategy behind the sudden popularity growth for anime in
the United States and the role it played in the anime boom seen in the 1990s. The author uses the
animated series Pokemon as an example to suggest that media mix marketing was used to boost
the popularity of shows by introducing video games, trading card games, manga and other types
of entertainment to strike a broader audience. One flaw to Daliot-Buls example is that Pokemon
started as a trading card game and not as an animated series although no matter what order
media mix marketing was definitely evident. Looking into his reference, it is clearly seen that
Daliot-Buls knowledge of media mix marketing came from Marc Steinbergs book, Anime's
Media Mix: Franchising Toys and Characters in Japan. Further reading into Steinbergs book,
Daliot-Bul missed an opportunity to discuss Anime Media mix which would have strengthened
his argument on the economic success that Japan anime culture had in the 1990s. Since Anime
Media mix was not referred to in Daliot-Buls article, one may think that the author was only
skimming his references rather than fully exploring the true depths of the cited books or articles.

Daliot-Bul cited an interview to forward upon his argument that anime is being evolved
into American cartooning. The direct quote from interview is shown below.

The Onion: Your drawing style is heavily influenced by anime. What about
that appeals to you?
Aaron McGruder: Its a better type of art for animation. I designed the
characters that way because I wanted it to be animated one day, and I knew
that was the direction I wanted to go way back then.

Daliot-Bul takes a direct quote from an interview that Aaron McGruder, the creator of
The Boondocks comic strip had with The Onion, a digital news organization heavily based on
satire, to help strengthen his argument on how anime reframed animation with in the United
States. Although this interview took place in 1999, before the popular animated series aired in
2005, it shows that McGruder was considering long term goals of an animation series for his
popular comic strip. Daliot-Bul shows signs of forwarding McGruders answer of why he thinks
that McGruder choose anime over any other style of animation. Even though the show is deeply
involved into African-American culture rather than Japanese culture, the author argues that
anime brings out individualistic eccentricity and spirit within each character of the show. The
author then brings up the term anime package when explaining the visual imaging behind The
Boondocks series in which he links with the popularity of anime in the late 1990s and the
broader audience that the animation would target rather than just young African-American adults.
Daliot-Bul concludes that anime was a great choice for The Boondocks television series.
The author shows signs of forwarding a direct quote that Aaron McGruder stated in an
interview and expanding upon his response to a question about anime. Daliot-Bul uses his
knowledge in 2014 about the animated series to help forward the original statement due to the
fact that in 1999 the animation of The Boondocks was only a long term goal for McGruder.

Daliot-Buls article is a very interesting read that will indeed help developing my
argument based paper. He touches upon some good points in how anime and Japan culture
impacted western society. Also he uses the specific anime series Dragon Ball and its popularity
in his paper which is one of the fan base communities that I will be observing during the research
portion of my paper. After doing research on his citations and how he used them in his article, I
will be more cautious and do background checks on his sources since I now know that he did not
fully utilize and in some cases misinterpreted his references.

Citation:
Lamarre, Thomas. "Notes." Anime Machine : A Media Theory of Animation. Minneapolis: U of
Minnesota, 2009. 336. Print

Daliot-Bul, Michal. "Reframing and Reconsidering the Cultural Innovations of the Anime Boom
on US Television." International Journal of Cultural Studies 17.1 (2014): 75-91. Print.

Steinberg, Marc. Anime's Media Mix : Franchising Toys and Characters in Japan. Minneapolis,
MN, USA: University of Minnesota Press, 2012.

Interview with Aaron McGruder, The A.V. Club, 6 October 1999, URL
http://www.avclub.com/articles/aaron-mcgruder,13622/