Cartooning in the Philippines

In the Philippines, cartooning applies visual artists who make cartoon characters to their own comic strip or book as a whole began with the publication of local comic books, known as komiks.

History

First Filipino cartoon

Main article: Kenkoy

During the late 1920s, Filipino writer Romualdo Ramos and Filipino visual artist Antonio “Tony” Velasquez created the cartoon character named Kenkoy. It appeared in the pages of the Tagalog-language Liwayway magazine as a weekly comic strip entitled Mga Kabalbalan ni Kenkoy or "Kenkoy's antics". Because of its popularity it became a Filipino icon and was translated into other regional languages in the Philippines. Since then, other cartoon characters were created by other Filipino comic book artists.

The creation of Kenkoy also influenced the works of Filipino musicians such as Nicanor Abelardo (the product was the libretto Hay Naku Kenkoy or "Oh, My Gosh, Kenkoy!"), and the emergence of atypical Kenkoy-like pronunciation of English words which came to be known as “Kenkoy’s English” and “Carabao English”. This influence of Kenkoy gave birth to original Filipino language vocabulary, such as Barok (also became a stand-alone cartoon character), Jeproks, and Pinoy, the colloquial form of the word Filipino. Kenkoy also survived the arrival of the Japanese during World War II. Kenkoy became a tool of the Japanese occupiers for disseminating health programs.

Other Filipinos who excelled in the Philippine komiks and cartoon industry are Francisco Coching, and Alex Niño.

Development

Some well-known cartoonists include Lauro "Larry" Alcala, who was known for his cartoon series named Slice of Life, Jeremias Elizalde Navarro, Vicente Peñetrante, José Zabala-Santos and Francisco Reyes.

One more was Alfredo P. Alcala who, apart from creating several comic strips in the Philippines, worked for American comic book firms, namely DC Comics, Dark Horse Comics, and Marvel Comics.

Editorial cartoons

In Davao, a Filipino English teacher named Leonila Liberato incorporated editorial cartoons, such as those from the Philippine Daily Inquirer, in her lesson plans for critical reading classes, resulting in her winning the Inquirer's Education (IIE) Lesson Plan Contest. Liberato's purpose was to acquaint Filipino students with current events and issues happening in the Philippines, and to promote a “higher order of thinking”, through editorial cartoons.

See also

• List of Filipino comic creators
• List of Filipino superheroes