Orient-Occident dans la bande dessinée. Nouveaux personnages et leur identité multiculturelle

In the essays about geopolitical discourse conveyed by the media (popular geopolitics) many texts have been analyzed to understand political space and power relations. Applying the same method, this article focuses on a set of comics mostly by Muslim authors, whose words and images are analyzed to better understand the cultural environment and the different worldviews of their authors: West-East dichotomy, the hybridization between cultures and the problems of multicultural societies such as antisemitism and islamophobia. In order to do this, two types of comics are used: first, autobiographies in which daily life in the Middle East is narrated in the first person and, secondly, adventures of superheroes with a Muslim identity. Apparently, comics may seem like ordinary entertainment products. On the contrary they also provide information on the characteristics of certain regions and denote precise geographical imaginaries. They also offer a particular perception of the political space as seen by the protagonists (whether individuals or groups) and the degree of participation or detachment of the author from the represented reality.