Manhua

Manhua (simplified Chinese: 漫画; traditional Chinese: 漫畫; pinyin: Mànhuà) are Chinese comics produced in Mainland China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan.

Etymology

The word "manhua", literally "impromptu sketches", is originally an 18th-century term used in Chinese literati painting. It became popular in Japan as manga in the early 19th century. Feng Zikai, in his 1925 series of cartoons entitled Zikai Manhua, reintroduced the term into Chinese in the modern sense.

History

The oldest surviving examples of Chinese drawings are stone reliefs from the 11th century BC and pottery from 5000 to 3000 B.C. Other examples include symbolic brush drawings from the Ming Dynasty, a satirical drawing titled "Peacocks" by the early Qing Dynasty artist Zhu Da, and a work called "Ghosts' Farce Pictures" from around 1771 by Luo Liang-feng. Chinese manhua was born in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, roughly during the years 1867 to 1927.

The introduction of lithographic printing methods derived from the West was a critical step in expanding the art in the early 20th century. Beginning in the 1870s, satirical drawings appeared in newspapers and periodicals. By the 1920s palm-sized picture books like Lianhuanhua were popular in Shanghai. They are considered the predecessor of modern-day manhua.

Record chart

A record chart is a ranking of recorded music according to popularity during a given period of time. Examples of music charts are the Hit parade, the Billboard Hot 100 or Top 40.

Many different criteria are used in different charts, including sales of records, cassettes and compact discs, the amount of radio airplay, and since the introduction of digital technology, the number of downloads and the amount of streaming activity.

Some charts are specific to a particular musical genre and most to a particular geographical location (although download charts are not easily pinned down in this way). The most common period of time covered by a chart is one week with the chart being printed or broadcast at the end of this time. Summary charts for years and decades are then calculated from their component weekly charts. Component charts have become an increasingly important way to measure the commercial success of individual songs.

Chart hit