Fourth International Conference on Communication & Media Studies

Abstract

Political cartoons in the Philippine Daily Inquirer which valorised the political image of a leader have been viewed as a catalyst for social transformation or development most especially in the visual political communications field. A cartoon may be a substitute for visual pleonasm and the non-verbal cues attached to it may yet be simple and complex to many, but it is dubbed as medicinal. It may invoke fun and satire, but it could be a source of exegesis all along. This shows that communications in their varied forms convey meaning within the whole, romancing allied disciplines such as history, arts, sociology and anthropology as they permeate all other forms of enquiry. The degree of aesthetization and processes involved in the making of editorial cartoons were purely hedonistic and forms ideations from the artist’s point of view. Semiotics as a simple based approach in the process and is aided by perception and reception has brought new meaning in ways of seeing things, which is the central philosophical issue of this research, “a plethora of political fire power” in visual political communication: editorial cartoons.