November 2011
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oliviawaite asked: Do you have a favorite octopus propaganda metaphor? I lean towards British Empire, but octopus-as-capitalism is often very stylish as well.
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Know your communist enemy
“I was amazed when I discovered your website because it reminded me of a picture that I found campy—but still evocative—even when I was in high school. It is something that /should/ be shared with the world, and where better than a website devoted to octopodes in politics.”
[VA: …snip…]
[Submitted by: Kevin Deegan-Krause (http://www.pozorblog.com)]
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"Shanghai Trader"
“Found this an old issue of Dragon Magazine (#136, August 1988). Don’t know anything about the actual game, alas.”
Submitted by: Richard Pilbeam
[VA: see The Mongolian Octopus - Phil May and “Yellow Peril”]
October 2011
1 post
Submissions
A quick note: purely by chance I’ve found submissions are being made to Vulgar Army that I’ve received no notification of *insert sad confused face*. I will look over these when I get back home in a few days. Lots of tentacled goodness to come.
August 2011
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May 2011
2 posts
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Giant Squid Captured
I received a note from David Pope on Twitter, that read “Will plead guilty for this [redacted]. Will plea bargain with this [redacted]”, I will leave it up to you to decide which was guilt, and which redemption.
The first is a response to the proposed mining tax in Australia (and unfortunately gutted - and I say this as someone who works in the mining industry). The second uses...
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January 2011
2 posts
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December 2010
2 posts
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The Tentacular Undead...
Please note: This is an earlier draft, more a bunch of ideas and notes than an actual argument).
… Or why are there no zombie octopuses in political cartoons?
[Author note: this is only a first pass, lots of vague arguments, and logical fallacies. And far to many “it could be argued, it has been argued, studies have shown” - well, you get the idea… Feedback welcome.]
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Rebecca Howland and The Real Estate Octopus
“Real Estate Octopus and Dead Horse”.
Photo by the Drawing Center (1983)
Photo by Becky Howland (1983)
October 2010
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Cephalopod Awareness Days
Cephalopod Awareness Day(s) are not yet sanctioned by any official governing body, but the purpose of the holiday is to bring attention to the diversity, biology and conservation of these bizarre and wonderful molluscs.
2010 Cephalopod Days (8-10th October) is hosted by: The Cephalopodiatrist
September 2010
13 posts
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“[C]artoon as text, as a cultural artefact which is neither a passive reflector...”
– Scully, R. and M. Quartly (2009). Using cartoons as historical evidence. Drawing the Line. R. Scully and M. Quartly. Melbourne, Monash University ePress: 1.01-1.13.
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Of Maps and Octopuses: Revisited
Previously: “Of Maps and Octopuses”.
Claude Marquet, ‘Fighting the Octopus’, Worker (Sydney), 12 November 1904. Reprinted p6.32 in ‘All the world over’, Dyrenfurth, Nick; Quartly, Marian, Drawing the Line 2009 1:1, 6.1-6.47
School of the Americas Watch (SOAW) have a poster featuring ‘the people’ cutting of the limbs of a skulltopus (Illustration by Haik Hoisington, 2006). The...
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August 2010
7 posts
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad attacks Octopus Paul -... →
More slander about octopuses spreading propaganda. (via hectocotyli)
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Flotilla cartoon followup
Sometimes I don’t notice things in cartoons that I really should. It is somewhat inexcusable given how many of these I see. As an example: The Carlos Latuff Israel as octopus vs Peace flotilla, from a couple of months ago. I did not see the swastika that replaced the Star of David on the Israeli flag.
Which brings me to the octopus and Israel. The octopus has been used as an anti-semitic...
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Further Reading
Books & Articles:
Ellis, Richard. The Search for the Giant Squid. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1999.
Ingemark, Camilla Asplund. “The Octopus in the Sewers: An Ancient Legend Analogue.” Journal of Folklore Research 45, no. 2 (2008): 145(26).
MacDougall, Robert. “The Wire Devils: Pulp Thrillers, the Telephone, and Action at a Distance in the Wiring of a Nation.” American Quarterly 58, no....
June 2010
13 posts
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The Octopus Speaks
The following is from: Los Angeles herald. (Los Angeles [Calif.]) October 27, 1910, p. 6
I am afraid there is no cartoon with this one. But, I thought it important for giving more context to who Standard Oil is, or was seen as, and why it was considered an octopus.
Can’t you just hear the indignation in the writer’s tone? Also, I think the title, and subtitle must have been written...
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Kraken Rising: How the Cephalopod Became Our... →
“Almost exactly a century later, in the first flush of the Digital Revolution (©Wired magazine), the cephalopod archetype resurfaced. This time, however, the semiotic polarities were reversed: the mythic image that gave shape to fears of Homo cyberneticus deformed by his overreliance on technology into a posthuman freak — his body “shriveled to nothing, a dangling degraded pendant” to his...