Els mecanismes retòrics en l’humor gràfic de tipus polític de la premsa generalista en llengua catalana, a partir de l’observació d’un corpus sobre el referèndum del 2017 a Catalunya

Abstract

This article is an approach to the main rhetorical linguistic mechanisms involved in the generation of humour in the political cartoons and comic strips published in the mainstream Catalan-speaking media such as Ara, El Periódico de Catalunya, El Punt / Avui and La Vanguardia.

The setting of this characterization is based on contributions from specialists in humour linguistics providing the theoretical basis for the analysis of a sample of ten cartoons focussing on the referendum of October 1, 2017 in Catalonia.

Regarding the work methodology, the present study is set within the analysis of discourse that emphasizes issues concerning the use of language and symbols in a given context. It is also based on hypothycodeductive and analytic approaches, which allows a qualitative treatment of data.

The analysis of the chosen cartoons involves the description of its main rhetoric mechanisms and the interpretation of the resulting data and it also outlines some general tendencies in terms of the behaviour of rhetoric in current political humour. The results obtained sustain the main hypothesis initially raised: despite the obvious differences in style among the cartoonists, there are broad similarities among the selected cartoons in terms of the predominant use of certain rhetorical figures as a strategy to generate humour, like the antithesis, the hyperbole, the irony and, to a lesser extent, the puns.