THE IMAGES OF THE PRESIDENTS OF RUSSIA AND THE UNITED STATES IN A POLITICAL CARTOON

Abstract

Studies in the field of the theory of polycode text are relevant in modern linguistics. On the basis of scientific works in the field of the theory of the polycode text (R. Barth, R. O. Jacobson, Y. A. Sorokin, M. Y. Fedosyuk, M. B. Voroshilova, E. V. Shustrova, E. V. Dzyuba and etc.) and political caricatures (E. A. Artemova, M. B. Voroshilova, D. Graiber, L. A. Mardieva, R. T. Saduov, E. V. Seredina, E. V. Shustrova and others) we make an attempt to analyze the images of political leaders of the United States and Russia in the political caricature of the 21st century. The article gives a brief overview of the role of precedence and metaphor in the political caricature. The work outlines the leading anthropomorphic images of American and Russian presidents, as well as the strategies and tactics of their formation from the point of view of cognitive metaphor. The classification of the most popular images of American presidents (J. W. Bush, B. Obama, D. Trump) in political caricatures is given during the period under review. The material was served by 300 texts of a poetic caricature with images of American and Russian presidents. Dominants of the images under consideration with the points of view of the theory of cognitive metaphor are formed. All analyzed objects are united in the categorial-semantic field of their own alienation. To achieve the goal of the study, the method of cognitive and contextual analysis was used. The overwhelming majority of the analyzed texts of American and British political cartoons show negative images of US presidents against the backdrop of a neutral or positive image of the Russian president, the most frequent tactics are unprofitable juxtaposition, creation of a defamatory context, idealization / glorification of one of the images.