To make fun of power: Cover Image

To make fun of power:
To make fun of power:

political cartoons and memes about President Zelensky. Quantitative and qualitative analysis

Author(s): Orest Semotiuk, Viktoriya Eduardivna Shevchenko
Subject(s): Politics / Political Sciences, Language and Literature Studies, Theoretical Linguistics, Applied Linguistics, Pragmatics, Sociolinguistics, Politics and communication, Politics and society
Published by: Krakowskie Towarzystwo Popularyzowania Wiedzy o Komunikacji Językowej Tertium
Keywords: political cartoon; memes; political humour; multimodal discourse analysis; content analysis

Summary/Abstract: The paper deals with Ukrainian President’s Zelensky image in political cartoons and memes. They are forms of political humour and can be examined in an interdisciplinary manner. The first part describes theoretical aspects, functions, and elements of political humour and political satire, main features and types of cartoons and memes. In the second part, the corpus of 198 political cartoons and 1121 memes from March 2019 to December 2020 is analysed with computer-aided content analysis and multimodal discourse analysis. The analysis units are social context, formed by the domestic and foreign political events in Ukraine in the research period, joke techniques and communication levels in the cartoons and memes. These units are examined chronologically and thematically. The research is based on the hypothesis about the interdependence of social context and subversive/supportive humour in the construction of Zelensky’s image.

  • Issue Year: 10/2022
  • Issue No: 4
  • Page Range: 82-98
  • Page Count: 17
  • Language: English