ABSTRACT
American writer Jim Lawrence and Catalan graphic artist Jordi Longarón are the creators of Friday Foster, the first syndicated comic strip to feature a black heroine, which began to run in 1970 in The Chicago Tribune. In the context of the American civil rights struggle and the Black Power movement, Villamandos explores the contribution of a Spanish artist to a pioneering narrative of female blackness, while also analyzing several ideological paradoxes. Among these paradoxes are representations of both Harlem and Spain that include stereotypical elements, a sympathetic portrayal of Franco’s Spain, expressions of Pan-African solidarity that resort to traditional white colonialist images, and a concept of black masculinity linked to the ideology of “respectability.” The critic concludes that Friday Foster offers an ambivalent amalgamation of social criticism with hegemonic narratives, and of black empowerment narratives with the commodification and fetishization of Black Power.
