Abstract. The paper investigates basic images that were applied to Edward Snowden in American caricature. We also give examples of transferred meanings, pun, decomposition of set-expressions and analyze images that are deeply rooted in culture. All these form the basis for satire and irony in political cartoons.

E. V. Shustrova

Ekaterinburg, Russia 10.02.20 

It would not be an exaggeration to say that one of the most striking and scandalous political events of the summer of 2013 was the escape of former US intelligence agent Edward Snowden, his long stay in the transit zone of Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport and his permission to stay in Russia for the next year.

Within the framework of the direction developed by the school "Political Linguistics" prof. A.P. Chudinov, we conducted a small study and tried to establish what consequences this led to at the level of a political creolized text, in particular a political cartoon. The basis of the research material was about 100 cartoons that appeared in the United States between June and October 2013.

It should be noted that this topic is rather painfully perceived by the American society.

Many cartoons criticizing the US position were either impossible to download, or they appeared on copies of the pages of sites that were almost immediately closed, or when they were downloaded, a virus attack began. Nevertheless, it was possible to collect quite representative material. One of the most frequent metaphorical models is the "Man is an insect" model.

In this case, a series of frames turned out: “Snowden is a fly”, “Snowden is a mosquito, mosquito”, “US authorities are a frog”, “US authorities are a man, suffering from bites”, “US authorities / the President of the United States is a man with a net, someone who hunts insects.” Undoubtedly, the frequency of this model is dictated by the homonymous meanings of the noun fly and the verb to fly. The noun has the following meanings: a) two-winged or flying insect; fly; b) insect pest (both pests of cereals and pests of livestock); c) bait insect; insect dummy used as bait, fly-fishing fly; d) spy, spy; policeman, cop.

The second block of values is associated with the flight of an insect and air means, including an airplane. The verb has the main meaning “to fly (about an insect, a bird)”. It also applies to aircraft: to fly (on an airplane), to fly, to pilot. The whole set of these meanings is easily transferred to the situation with E. Snowden, who traveled from country to country by plane, was stopped in the transit zone of the airport, spoiled a lot of blood of the US administration, harmed the US intelligence services, in the past he himself worked as an intelligence agent. At the same time, E. Snowden was perceived not only as a person who was genuinely shocked by the situation in his country, but also as a person who provoked another wave of tension in relations between the United States and Russia.

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http://elar.uspu.ru/bitstream/uspu/731/1/plin-2014-01-12.pdf

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