Estetyka The Polish Journal i Krytyka of Aesthetics 43 (4/2016), DOI: 10.19205/43.16.1 Noelle Leslie dela Cruz* Surviving Hiroshima: An Hermeneutical Phenomenology of Barefoot Gen by Keiji Nakazawa1 Abstract In this paper, I present a philosophical analysis of the famous manga series, Bare‑ foot Gen (Hadashi no Gen memoir of his childhood as an atom bomb survivor in Hiroshima, Japan. Against the backdrop of larger issues) of by war Keiji and Nakazawa, peace, Gen’s which family is the struggles author’s with quasi‑fictional his father’s ideological rebellion against the nation’s militaristic rule, leading to the family’s persecution. The story then chronicles the cataclysmic effects of the bomb, and the fates of Gen and other survivors as they live through the aftermath of the detona‑ tion and the hardships of the American occupation. My framework for critique fol‑ lows Paul Ricoeur’s hermeneutical phenomenology, which applies the descriptive method of phenomenology to cultural texts. Key words Paul Ricoeur, manga, graphic memoirs, comics, sequential art, hermeneutical phenomenology, Barefoot Gen, Hiroshima, Keiji Nakazawa, autobiography * PhilosophyEmail:
[email protected] Department PaperDe La presentedSalle University, at the 2015Philippines national conference of the Philosophical Associa‑ 1 pertainingtion of the Philippines, to Ricoeur’s “Doing hermeneutical Philosophy phenomenology in the Philippines,” and the held formal at Casa elements, San Pablo is‑ sues,in San and Pablo theories City, Laguna, related Philippines,to comics have on May been 8 ‑excerpted10, 2015. The from sections my unpublished of this paper re‑ search project sponsored by the University Research and Coordination Office of De La Salle University.