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New Zealand Geographer (2014) 70, 140–145 doi: 10.1111/nzg.12053

Geo-Ed

Teaching physical geography at university with

cartoons and comic strips: Motivation,
construction and usage
Christopher Gomez
Department of Geography, College of Sciences, University of Canterbury,
Private Bag 4800, Christchurch 8140, New Zealand

Abstract: This article presents the cartoons and comic strips that the author draws
and has used in his teaching of physical geography at the undergraduate level since
2011. In the context of an image-based culture, this article discusses the pedagogic
goals that cartoons and comic strips fulfil: enhancing learning and creativity, associ-
ating pleasure with learning, pushing students to think ‘outside the box’ and relating
the students’ learning experience to a media framework popular with students.
Cartoons and comic strips also answer particular necessities related to the teaching of
physical geography. Using characters placed in hypothetical situations, they explain
the process of doing geography and being a physical geographer.
Key words: cartoon, creativity, geography teaching, manga, physical geography,
undergraduate education.

Introduction been named gakushu manga. Any Westerner

In the internal newspaper of Juniata College
(Huntingdon, Pennsylvania, USA), Associate
Professor Jay Hossler (2009) presented his six-
year journey to create a biology ‘comic-book
textbook’ as a long and tedious enterprise.
However, he remembered having learnt ‘a lot
of new words like “invincible” or “indestruct-
ible” ’ (Hossler 2009, p. 43) in comic books
when he was a child, and he knew that the
‘comic-book textbook’ was worth the labour as
a result. Although such projects are still mar-
ginal, if not ignored, in the Anglo-Saxon world
(Bouvard 2011), educational comics – or more
precisely, educational manga – are an integral
part of the teaching landscape in countries such
as Japan. This form of manga appeared in Japan
towards the end of the 1980s, and the genre has
who walks into a Japanese library will be
amazed by the plethoric variety of manga,
including a wide educational selection ranging
from primary-school to university level. Suc-
cessful educational mangas have even reached
sales volumes comparable with those of
entertainment-oriented ones, with the famous
Manga Nihon Keizai Nyuumon (Introduction
to the Japanese Economy through Manga)
having sold more than 2 million copies.
The other country with a long tradition of
teaching using comics, and the one that con-
sumes the second highest number of manga
every year just after Japan, is France (Swift
2009; Ratier 2013). As early as 1978, Marsh
wrote that ‘in France . . . the instructional use
of comics (la bande dessinée or BD) is widely
accepted’ (Marsh 1978, p. 777), with most of the

Note about author: Christopher Gomez is a geomorphologist working on geomorphometry at various scales
to understand the links between processes and landforms. He also relates these processes to environmental
issues and hazards, mostly for high-energy events in arc islands of the Pacific, with an emphasis on Indonesia
and Japan. A senior lecturer in the Department of Geography at the University of Canterbury.

E-mail: christopher.gomez@canterbury.ac.nz

© 2014 New Zealand Geographical Society

 Interactive educational comics
material being targeted to elementary and sec-
ondary schools. The author’s own memories of
junior high school in France in the early 1990s
are filled with comic strips on historical events
like the fall of the Bastille; the comic-book
series Alix, used to teach ancient European
history; and the comics created to teach
German and Spanish as foreign languages.
In the current context, comic strips are being
progressively incorporated into the educational
landscape (e.g. Kakalios 2002; Gonzalez-
Espada 2003; Wane 2013). Initially they were
the preserve of only a few educators
(Hutchinson 1949) and were used in the teach-
ing of foreign languages in particular, because
this discipline is in need of ‘situations’ and dia-
logues that are easy to picture (e.g. Vacca 1959).
More recently, other disciplines have also been
using comic strips, using a humorous story to
convey complex messages, such as human
rights concepts (Tuncel & Ayva 2010).
Teaching in a ‘culture of
the image’
In our current context, where there is a ‘culture
of the image’ encompassing the television,
desktop, laptop, tablet and smartphone, images
are everywhere in children’s and young adults’
lives. As Ross & Vinson (2003, p. 6) write, ‘All
around us, 24/7, we face a steady and unremit-
ting bombardment of purposeful representa-
tions . . . advertisements, photographs, dolls,
photocopies, television shows, movies, DVDs,
web pages, and so on.’ In his famous talk at a
Technology, Entertainment, Design (TED)
event, the education specialist Sir Ken Robin-
son explained that traditional schooling is most
certainly failing to retain the interest of students
because it communicates ‘boring stuff’ while the
students are being bombarded with exciting
images on a regular basis. It is most certainly
true that the excitement of learning something
new in the digital age, in which information is
accessible everywhere at any time, is not the
same as it was 30 or 40 years ago, when one had
to patiently browse through piles of books –
sometimes hard to access – to gain information.
This reality has led to fewer students reading
books or accessing information in a ‘conven-
tional way’. J. Cole, director of the Center for
the Digital Future at the University of South-
141
ern California, has reported that ‘adolescents
consider the Internet to be their most impor-
tant resource, surpassing . . . television, radio,
newspapers, and [obviously] books’ (Strom
et al. 2010). This increased interest of adoles-
cents in material distributed over the Internet
has led educational institutions to adapt by
notably increasing the use of Internet-based
content, even reaching students through social
networks. Although the value of the latter prac-
tice is perhaps debatable, the use of media
incorporating text and images in a manner that
is appealing to the younger generation appears
essential.
Cartoons and comic strips in
physical geography
Tuncel and Ayva (2010, p. 1447) wrote, ‘Comics
catch the attention of . . . children with
[humor]. On the other hand, according
to . . . learning theories, creative activities
make . . . learning more effective.’ In this
article, the author aims to present a comic-
based method that combines the comic-strip
medium and creative activities for use at the
undergraduate and graduate levels.
I started to use comic strips and cartoons at
the Geography Department of the University of
Canterbury from 2011 to teach physical geogra-
phy at all undergraduate levels. In both
‘GEOG109: Forces in Nature’ and ‘GEOG201:
Environmental Processes’, they are an effective
bridge from high school and a good way to raise
interest in the discipline of geography. In
‘GEOG305: Environmental Hazards’, comics
are also an effective way to introduce complex
and sensitive issues, using humour for instance
(Fig. 1). Besides these course-specific goals, the
material also serves particular pedagogical aims,
partly shaped by the experience of teaching
geography to New Zealand university students.
Firstly, the physical geography courses are
largely based on field components and the
ability of students to read the landscape and
draw inferences from it. The students also need
to be able to extract different types of proxy
data from the environment for further
laboratory-based analysis. Although the com-
prehension of the results and the subject matter
of physical geography and the Environmental
Hazards course can comprehensively be taught
© 2014 New Zealand Geographical Society
142 C. Gomez

Figure 1 Example of cartoons using humour to deal with sensitive questions in environmental hazards.
(a) Cartoon presenting the problems of inequality in the face of environmental hazards. (b) Cartoon used to
introduce a serious environmental problem.

© 2014 New Zealand Geographical Society

 Interactive educational comics 143

with traditional text, images and videos, the
process of reaching these results and the
process of creating the information requires a
mise en situation (setting up of a scene), for
which comic strips can be a powerful tool.
Indeed, it seems natural to set up scenes and
situations with characters doing different things
(Fig. 2) using cartoons and comic strips.
Depending on the goal of the exercise, the
‘actor’ can represent the student, the teacher, or
even a professional practitioner or layperson.
In the case of classes on, for instance, natural
hazards as taught in geography, comic strips can
be very helpful to teach the various points of
view of the different actors (resident adults,
children, city council, scientists, etc.) in a crisis
situation and what their different plans of
response might be. Recently, in the field of
medical education, comics have begun to be
used with a similar purpose, exposing students
to different medically relevant situations and
generating reflections about the experience of
illness from the different points of view of
patients, families and medical practitioners
(Green 2013).
Secondly, in an academic world of very spe-
cialised and compartmentalised knowledge,
traditional university lectures at undergraduate
level scarcely provide a framework to help stu-
dents understand, apply or just imagine how to
use and develop this specialist knowledge. I
argue that the path towards enhanced learning
and creativity – breaking free from the silos we
are being educated in – can be achieved
through the use of cartoons and comic strips.
Indeed, such material links the learning experi-
ence to a certain level of ‘fun’ and pleasure, and
as behavioural psychologists have stated, indi-
viduals are likely to repeat actions that are
associated with pleasant experiences (e.g.
Glover & Gary 1976). The cartoon also pro-
vides an escape from the walls of the classroom,
with scenes and situations incorporating
elements that are complementary to the
material being taught. This is essential to the
production of ideas, as stated in Mednick’s
associative theory (1962). It is indeed essential
to offer a wide range of remote and unrelated
ideas as building blocks for students to gather
together for the creation of their own learning
content. The cartoons created by the author
engage the students in a dialogue through ques-
tions that the students have to answer, blank
dialogues and puzzles, bringing together

Figure 2 The first three pages of the comic strip used in a second-year physical geography class. It depicts
characters (students?) on a camping trip on a stratovolcano. While they climb the volcano, they encounter
different situations that will lead them to answr a series of questions. (a) Set-up of a situation, which is not
related to the content of the lecture. (b) Break in the storyline for an important point of explanation.
(c) Question arising from the story, used to incite the students to learn through inquiry. (d) Location where
photographs can be added to the cartoon. (e) Hints on what can be seen in the landscape and what questions
one can raise about it.

© 2014 New Zealand Geographical Society

144 C. Gomez
material relevant to the lecture and material
relevant to geography and the sciences in
general, forcing the students to relate the
lecture material to a wider body of knowledge
and experience.
Thirdly, as contemporary students consume
media in a very different manner from previous
generations, it is important to be able to offer
them material that corresponds to what their
generation is used to but that also fulfils aca-
demic imperatives. Comic strips offer a good
compromise, as they can be read from the start
to the end in continuity in the same way as a
traditional text, but the pictorial content also
allows students more used to consuming media
in small chunks to quickly extract the informa-
tion they need in the same way in which they
would browse the Internet. To refer back to the
manga culture mentioned in the introduction,
manga is one medium that readers can browse
for some of the content without reading the
whole text. The comic strips I draw for the
physical geography classes are constructed in
the same manner, with a general narrative that
brings the reader from the start to the end, but
also a series of points that are highlighted
through the use of easily recognisable breaks in
the flow of strips. This results in a format that
looks like a web page in some aspects: an
assemblage of text and images (including
photographs) with key points that are designed
to attract the attention of the reader (Fig. 2).
Finally, the comic narrative provides some
extra space for reflection on relevant knowl-
edge and experience, such as the questions of
health and safety in the field. This space is
useful for reminding students of the rules of
being students and, in the future, professionals
(Figs 1,2).
Conclusion
This article argues that in countries like France
or Japan, the manga and comic strip have
reached the same rank as other literature
genres and have been widely used and devel-
oped for pedagogical purposes, whereas the
Anglo-Saxon world has not done much in this
direction. The author has therefore presented
some examples of his work in order to inspire
and to give some traction to this genre for edu-
cation in geography. The comic strips that the
© 2014 New Zealand Geographical Society
author writes also include space for questions,
blanks to fill, puzzle games, and so on, bringing
to the comic material a dimension of enquiry-
based learning and creativity so as to engage
the students in a dialogue. Although it has
obvious attractions, this method is not without
limitations: the instructor needs either to be
able to draw his/her own cartoons or to use
already drawn images, the latter propelling the
conversation into the challenge of copyright
issues. The next step towards democratisation
of this teaching method might therefore be the
development of public-domain drawings and
comic strips that teachers could adapt without
having to worry about drawing skills or copy-
right issues.
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© 2014 New Zealand Geographical Society