Humour and climate change: a caustic look through Indian comic strips

ABSTRACT

Climate change communication generally comprises disconcerting photography of catastrophes or fearful rhetoric of impending doom that often produce a sense of hopelessness in people. On the other hand, cartoons on climate change combine graphic presentations with humour and try to turn an issue temporally distant, like climate change, into the familiar. Self-identification stimulated by the iconicity of cartoons, along with self-criticism evoked by satire, sarcasm, and humour, help the readers recognise their complicity in the matter. This paper analyses three comic strips published in reputed newspapers in India—Green Humour by Rohan Chakravarty, Ecotism by Ashvini Menon, and The Wildscapes by Deborshee Gogoi – to highlight how cartoons contribute significantly to raising awareness of critical issues like climate change.

KEYWORDS:

• Climate change
• cartoons
• humour
• comic strips
• ecology

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).