Cartoon as Voices for National Development: The Nigerian Experience

Abstract

This paper made case for cartooning as an element of media journalism that has an influencing capacity to destroy all bureaucratic barriers and pass on the message of common burning national issues to the leaders in a subtle way that is devoid of deformity or embarrassing such public office holders as their intended target. The paper saw cartoon as an instrument in the hands of the journalist who can use it to break the chain of communication that has been blocked by appointed or elected public office holders. We adopted literature review as the methodology for the research. We also carried out some casual oral interviews with stakeholders in the media industries, classrooms and street readers among others to ascertain the extent to which cartoon can be used to pass on a corrective or criticizing message to the leaders of our dear country without the intention of arousing anger and spite in the person. It was concluded that cartoons can do the magic of criticizing any action or calling the attention of the public and their leaders to burning national issues of national interest and development. We concluded by recommending how effective these can be  if cartoon is properly used.

Keywords: cartoon, zoomorphology, burning national issues, national development,euphemism.