Cartoons in Hard Times

<b>Choice Outstanding Academic Title 2018</b><br/><i><i><br/></i>Cartoons in Hard Times </i>provides a comprehensive analysis of the short subject animation released by the Walt Disney and Warner Brothers from 1932 and 1945 one of the most turbulent periods in Unites States history. Through a combination of content analysis historical understanding and archival research this book sheds new light on a hitherto unexplored area of animation suggesting the ways in which Disney and Warner Brothers animation engaged with historical social economic and political changes in this era. <br/><br/>The book also traces the development of animation into a medium fit for propaganda in 1941 and the changes in characters tone music and narrative that took place to facilitate this transition. Animation transformed in this era from a medium of entertainment to a socio-political commentator before finally undertaking government sponsored propaganda during the Second World War.