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Contributor: David R Isquick
Country: China
City: Shanghai
In China, it’s interesting how authority figures as well as something serious like a food safety sign use cartoon like depictions.
Building on everyone's comments, I recall seeing an advertisement in the subway station for some type of medicine...featuring an animated stomach. Yes, stomach. The organ appeared to be happy and dancing. Animation seems quite popular and obviously a desirable form of advertising!
I liked this example of Authority over the food industry - it also shows a bit of context because it provides an example of rules and regulations that need to be follwed and enforced.
I also thought it was funny how frequently a serious authoritative message was paired with a cartoon or animated picture. Even on the roads we saw some serious traffic signs with cartoon-like depictions of people getting into car accidents. As Americans, we often associated cartoons with comedy, but for the Chinese, this is definitely not always the case!
This was similar to the cartoon character safety guards at the airports - they are paper cut outs (similar to the image in the left corner of this picture). To me they seem ineffective since they are paper but you see them everywhere! Maybe for the Chinese it is just a reminder and that is all you need to obey.
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