Covid-19 in the Mass Media Through the Lens of South African Editorial Cartoons: An Exploratory Study

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis study explored the main themes present in South African editorial cartoons related to Covid-19 published in 2020 to examine how they portrayed the societal discourse around the pandemic. Our data set of 1196 single-frame editorial cartoons, created by 19 cartoonists in three languages and published in 24 publications over the course of 2020, shows that Covid-19 was a pertinent topic for South African cartoonists. Thematically, “politics and government” dominated as broad themes, while other pertinent themes were “society and social consequences”, “economic impacts” and “health”. Politics and politicians were prominent, but science and scientists were represented only rarely. In terms of tone, the cartoons were predominantly negative, with fear as a frequently used emotional appeal. Very few cartoons contained educational messages, but most did depict the virus and face masks, which could have heightened public awareness about health-related issues. We conclude that editorial cartoons added to the media coverage of the pandemic, often adding to general media discourses of fear and anxiety, and therefore it is likely that these cartoons influenced public sentiment. Furthermore, through their focus on politicians, these cartoons added to the politicisation of the pandemic, but made only a minor contribution to public education and the combating of misinformation.