• Cartoon and Animation Studies
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• s.49
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• pp.563-588
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• 2017

Cats used to be long avoided in Korean culture due to prejudices on their negative implications, yet they are increasingly being favoured by domestic readers along with a growing number of cat lovers, picture books, essays and webtoons. In the case of Yoko Sano's work, half of her published books in Korea depicts cats. Among those is 'The Cat That Lived a Million Times' which is a worldwide million seller. The research analyses five picture books on cats published in Korea, focusing on finding out symbolic representation of cats other than merely being the protagonist of the book. Sano asserts that we respect our own free well and love ourselves just as cats do in her books. In conclusion, cats in Sano's work mostly represent the author herself, which are sometimes depicted as mother and son. The colours and thick outlines of her cats, unlike tender characteristics, describes self-righteous strong personality, while emphasising both static and dynamic movements.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.22 no.6
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• pp.369-385
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• 2022

This thesis was a phenomenological study of an after-school picture book making program for middle school students. This study attempted to establish a theoretical system for picture book making activity by analyzing the process of self-discovery and healing through the picture book making activity. The participants were six middle school students, the picture book making activity program was organized into five stages, and in-depth interviews of the study participants and their interpretation of picture books were described. According to the research results, first, the making activity of picturebooks can construct one's own world through hyper-reality that is more excessive than the original. Second, it can be said that the fearful existence of a monster has developed awareness and insight to view its own problems from various angles through defamiliarization. These results might be that the making activity of picturebooks is a way of revealing one's existence to the world, and through this, the process of exploring and constructing the meaning of oneself and daily life. Discussion was made based on this about the creation of another world where the picturebook making activity is different from the original, the stimulating effect of the subconscious mind through the defamiliarization device, and the establishment of self-existence in picturebook creation.