Problem
1) Discuss the meaning of the political cartoon in reference to civic duty, responsibility, and citizenship.
2) Analyze some of the visual techniques employed by the cartoonist and how they are used to convey this message. While not every political cartoon will utilize every technique, the following are some of the techniques a political cartoonist might employ:
a) Symbolism: Where objects or persons act as stand-ins for larger concepts or abstract ideas.
b) Exaggeration: Where characteristics of some person or object are made out to be more extreme. Alternately, what might be the meaning of depicting persons or objects as uniform or relatively featureless?
c) Labeling: Political cartoons often label important objects. Alternately, what might it mean if visually important elements are not labelled?
d) Analogy: Where the cartoon makes an important comparison between seemingly unlike things. What is the meaning behind this comparison?
e) Irony: Which toys with expectations and the difference between how things are and are expected to be. What is the point to this play?
f) Artistic choices in terms of linework, use of color and space, texture, etc.