Famous Like Me > Writer > M > Aaron McGruder
Profile of Aaron McGruder
on Famous Like Me |
| |
| Name: |
Aaron McGruder |
|
| |
|
| Also Know As: |
|
| |
|
| Date of Birth: |
29th May 1974 |
| |
|
| Place of Birth: |
Chicago, Illinois, USA |
| |
|
| Profession: |
Writer |
| |
|
From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia
Aaron McGruder (born May 29, 1974) is an African American comic strip author, best known for writing and drawing the comic strip The Boondocks.
McGruder was born in Chicago, Illinois and moved to Columbia, Maryland as a child. He attended the University of Maryland, College Park, graduating with a degree in African American Studies. The Boondocks made its debut in the campus newspaper, The Diamondback, in late 1996. He created and worked on the comic while working at the Presentation Graphics Lab on campus.
A frequent public speaker on political and cultural issues, McGruder gave a Keynote speech at H2K2. He now lives in Los Angeles, where he is working on projects including an animated Boondocks. He is also the co-author, with Reginald Hudlin, of a graphic novel, Birth of a Nation, drawn by cartoonist Kyle Baker and published in 2004.
In 2002, he was contacted by the Green Party, which asked if he would like to run for president with the party. McGruder was forced to decline the offer because, at 28, he was too young to serve.
Controversy
The content of Mr. McGruder's comic strip has often come under fire for being too politically liberal, and occasionally risque, leading to its being published in the op-ed section of many newspapers. For example, a strip which made fun of BET's rap videos that rely on lewd female gyrations and a strip which mocked Whitney Houston's drug problems have been pulled out of circulation for emphasizing the derrier and marijuana use, even though they were done so in parody. McGruder had also gotten hate mail for his unflattering portrayal of white racism, but truly rose to prominence after 9/11, when he alluded to Reagan's support of Osama Bin Laden, and he "censored" the strip by featuring a patriotic yellow ribbon and a flag instead of the usual cast.
At the same time, Mr. McGruder has himself amassed controversy, specifically following his visit with Fidel Castro in Cuba after requested to do so by California Congresswoman Barbara Lee.
At the NAACP Image Awards in 2002, he was approached by then-National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, who asked if McGruder would draw her into the comic strip. McGruder allegedly replied, to her face, "I don't draw mass murderers." (But he did later draw her in the strip for May 20, 2004.)
External Links
New Yorker profile
Boondocks.net
This content from
Wikipedia is licensed under the
GNU Free Documentation License.
It uses material from the Wikipedia article Aaron McGruder
|
