We have dealt with Lynda Barry’s graphic memoir, One Hundred Demons, and you have been
asked to narrow your focus to two or three different selections. The “Demons” of the title are
events she characterizes as having a lingering power to stay around despite being many years
from them in some cases. Throughout the collection, Barry explores growing up in a
multigenerational Filipino-American household within a diverse and complex neighborhood. She
dedicates a number of chapters to this thread, either wholly or in part. Barry discusses this
experience in its full complexity, both the richness and challenges. She also included chapters,
and in the talk you viewed, concerning the way others didn’t necessarily view her as a diverse
person, but didn’t really perceive her as belonging to their peer groups either. Consequently, she
often notes that she remained a bit of an outsider almost anywhere she went. As we are shaped
by our experiences, she often revisits this familial background. Even when that identity is not the
primary driving force of a given chapter, it is still present, implicitly or explicitly.
Choosing two to three chapters, select at least one focusing on her younger life with family
and/or neighborhood growing up, and identify the ways that diverse experience shapes the
person she becomes. Selecting another chapter in which that identity doesn’t seem to be at the
forefront, identify and discuss the ways her background clearly influences the events portrayed,
sometimes in profound ways. How is her later journey influenced by the experiences of her
younger years? Your argument will be more successful if you build actual bridges among your
selections, discussing the ways you see narrative influences from one to the other, rather than
just pointing out differences.
For quotations, just identify the particular demon, then then page and panel. For example: “In
‘Dogs,’ Barry notes in the second panel on page 173,” (and then include your pertinent quotation
from that panel, and discuss its importance to your idea. Please make selections which require
you to do some of the work of building this argument. As you’re working, ask yourself “where
do I see her family’s and culture’s influence in this later chapter? What passages illustrate this is
a valid observation?” Obviously, do not use these questions literally in your paper, just use them
yourself as you’re developing your position.
