A pragma-sociolinguistic interpretation of cartoons as visio-verbal communication

Abstract

Cartoons are often viewed as caricatured drawings published in newspapers and magazines merely to create humour. But this is just the base intention. Cartons are a means of communicating and commenting on sundry serious (inter)national issues that make the news. Through cartoons the ludicrous in the society is highlighted and the ideal projected. Apart from the drawing, the message of a cartoon is also communicated in the accompanying words, phrases and/or sentences. It is in this sense that cartoons constitute a form of visual-cum-verbal communication. In this paper, I examined how cartoons communicate meaning and intention, using insights from pragmatics and sociolinguistics as a theoretical framework. My conclusion is that cartoons communicate meaning only when the cartoonist’s presuppositions and inferences are also shared by the target audience.

Index Terms - cartoon, communication, discourse, pragma-sociolinguistics.