Analysis of a Political Cartoon: Trump, Zuckerberg Dinner

This essay provides a detailed analysis of a political cartoon depicting a secret dinner between Donald Trump and Mark Zuckerberg. The student examines the cartoonist's techniques, including symbolism, irony, imagery, and the use of color and language, to convey a specific message about the relationship between the two figures and the impact of the Cambridge Analytica issue. The analysis highlights how the cartoonist, Joe Fournier, uses visual elements to portray the power dynamics and the potential consequences of the dinner. The essay explores the cartoonist's perspective on the situation, emphasizing the use of irony and symbolism to convey the message effectively. The conclusion summarizes the effectiveness of the cartoon in simplifying a complex message and its ability to convey a nuanced perspective on the relationship between Trump and Zuckerberg.

Running head: ANALYSIS OF A POLITICAL CARTOON
Analysis Of A Political Cartoon
Name of the student
Assignment name: Cartoon Analysis
Current Date
MLA Format

2ANALYSIS OF A POLITICAL CARTOON
A Comic strip can be defined as an illustration in boxes that convey an amusing story
(Northrop). Political cartoons are sketched to pick fun on a political situation and shed light
on several political situations. The following section of the paper discusses the techniques,
colour tone and language used by a cartoonist and their analysis is provided in the latter part.
In this paper, a cartoon illustrating the secret dinner Mark Zukerberg and Donald Trump will
be analysed. Joe Fournier uses symbolism, irony and imagery to show how the future of
Trump and Zuckerberg relationship is in reality and the role of Trump in the situation.
Joe Fournier has sketched this cartoon in the context of Mark Zuckerberg and Donald
Trump secret dinner, which is evident from the caption of the cartoon (Chicagotribune.com,
2020). Cartoonists to put their opinion about the subject uses different methods and
techniques (Darmawan and Piliang), and Joe has made his point in the comic strip by writing
an ironical conversation along with symbolism and labelling as a technique to depict the
situation
In the cartoon, Fournier has shown three moments from secret dinner of Trump and
Zuckerberg. The situation shown is tensed for Zuckerberg as represented by the cartoonist
through exaggerating the dark circle of the character. While Donald Trump is portrayed as a
relaxed individual as his body movements are not restricted like Zuckerberg in the cartoon.
The cartoonist wanted to show the impact of the Cambridge Analytica issue on both the
characters. While Zuckerberg company is hugely impacted Trump was not affected by the
situation
In a comic strip, colour depicts the mood of the situation (Van Hecke). Here the
colour palette is limited and in the shade of blue, thus creating a colder effect and
symbolising the status of the situation. In the comic in two places combination of red and

3ANALYSIS OF A POLITICAL CARTOON
white is shown firstly in a white shirt and red tie of Trump secondly in the chicken bucket,
thus depicting the US flag.
Here simple English language is used. The irony is used as a figurative element in the
last speech of Trump, where he sarcastically replies to Zuckerberg concern about the impact
of the dinner by giving reference of James Comey ( Comey was dismissed by trump after the
dinner). Cartoonist uses irony to give out their opinion about the topic and here also Fournier
has done the same and expressed what he felt about the secret dinner. He revealed that this
dinner would not impact Trump but it may affect Zuckerberg like it affected Comey.
This political cartoon can be analysed as smart work. Symbolism has been used in the
cartoon where a red and white colour bucket is kept on the middle of both the characters thus
signifying us the US and Trump is also labelled as representer of US with the choice of his
attire. Trump compares their dinner with James Comey, whom he has dismissed after the
dinner. So the irony is used in the conversation by the cartoonist. Symbolism and irony are
used by the cartoonist to reveal the message (Fukusato et al.). Use of imagery is also well
done by exaggerating the facial features of the characters.
Thus, in conclusion, it can be understood that cartoonist Joe Fournier has smartly
drawn the caricatures. He did not choose any ideology or side with the characters but was
able to put the point. Political comics are effectual as it simplifies a complicated message for
the readers, in this cartoon also the cartoonist tone in the sketch was simple but filled with
inner meaning because he has subliminally given the message and the reference is not direct.
Thus we can say this an outstanding work of art and skill.

4ANALYSIS OF A POLITICAL CARTOON
Noted
Chicagotribune.com (2020). Chicago Tribune - We are currently unavailable in your region.
[online] Chicagotribune.com. Available at:
https://www.chicagotribune.com/opinion/chi-editorial-cartoon-gallery-
photogallery.html [Accessed 8 Feb. 2020].
Darmawan, Ferry, and Yasraf A. Piliang. "Cartoonist visual communication through online
political cartoon in the era of the government of President Susilo Bambang
Yudhoyono." SOSIOHUMANIKA 8.2 (2015).
Fukusato, Tsukasa, et al. "Computational cartoonist: A comic-style video summarization
system for anime films." International Conference on Multimedia Modeling.
Springer, Cham, 2016.
Northrop, Sandy. American Political Cartoons: From 1754 to 2010. Routledge, 2017.
Van Hecke, Matti. "Imag (in) ing the eurocrisis: a comparative analysis of political
cartoons." National Identities 19.1 (2017): 129-147