Propaganda

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Propaganda
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Early propaganda study

• The first propaganda studies followed the First
  World War
• Development of mass media
• Creel Committee
• Allied propaganda
• Exorbitant claims by PR/ad people after the war
  was over

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Goals of early propaganda study

• Arm citizens against insidious communication
• Learn rules of effective rhetoric
• Develop methods for successful use of propaganda
  by business and government

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Between the wars

• The Institute for Propaganda Analysis set up
• Developed a list of seven common propaganda
  devices
• Appeal to emotion rather than reason
• They make us believe and do something we would
  not believe or do if we thought about it calmly,
  dispassionately . . .

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Seven devices

• The name calling device
• The glittering generalities device
• The transfer device
• The testimonial device
• The plain folks device
• The card stacking device
• The band wagon device

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Name calling

• a device to make us form a judgment without
  examining the evidence on which it should be
  based
• Propagandist attempts to attach negative labels
  to those she wants us to condemn
• terrorist extremist dictator
• Very common form of propaganda

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Glittering generalities

• propagandist identifies his program with virtue
  by the use of virtue words
• truth freedom honor
• Meant to make us accept and approve of the
  propagandists position, group, etc. without an
  analysis of the facts.

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Transfer

• the propagandist carries over the authority,
  sanction, and prestige of something we respect
  and revere to something he would have us accept
• Have church or nation approve of action
• Flags, crosses in background

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Testimonial

• An individual professes support or opposition
• I think President Bush is doing a wonderful job.

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Plain Folks

• Related to testimonial
• Propagandists win our confidence by appearing to
  be people like ourselvesjust plain folks among
  the neighbors
• Candidates kiss babies, government officials hang
  out on the front porch for photo ops, eat local
  cuisine

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Card stacking

• Propagandist uses underemphasis and overemphasis
  to dodge issues and evade facts. He resorts to
  lies, censorship, and distortion. He omits facts.
  
• Raises red herring issues to draw attention
  away from embarrassing issues

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Band Wagon

• a device to make us follow the crowd . . . His
  theme is everybodys doing it

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More recent work on propaganda

• Though the seven devices are a good start, they
  have several problems
• Some are vague (card stacking)
• They are limited mainly to specific word usage
• What is not said
• Context
• Societal myths
• Visuals
• Framing

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Bias

• Much of recent study of propaganda, news and
  other forms of political propaganda look at bias
• Bias is the uneven treatment of sides to an issue
• Often looked at as unfair treatment of one side
  of a bipolar conflictDemocrat/Republican,
  conservative/liberal

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Bias

• Indications of bias
• One side gets more time/better placement
• Tougher questioning of one side than the other
• One side is treated more kindly
• Adjectives/adverbs
• Rolling the eyes, etc.
• Softball questions
• Other demonstrations of support

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Context

• Recent events
• Social mood
• Wider discussion that the individual issue, etc.
  is placed within
• Explicit allusions

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Framing/ideology

• More sophisticated, and more difficult is the
  attempt to determine the larger story being told,
  and how it may distort a fair analysis of an
  issue, action, etc.
• Assumptions inherent in the culture
• Master narratives that have great impact
• Socially agreed-upon biases

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Assumptions inherent in the culture

• U.S. is
• Secularized
• Democratic
• Capitalist
• Conservative economically
• Liberal socially
• Racist
• Sexist (though not too bad by comparison with
  other societies)
• Individualist

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Master narratives

• Societal myths provide significant source for the
  discussion of topics, powerful support for varied
  positions
• Horatio Alger myth
• Cold War scenario
• Cowboy/wild west myth

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Socially agreed-upon biases

• Progress
• Technology
• Christian religions
• Sexual liberalism

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Framing

• Telling the larger story within which the
  individual incident, policy, or action is placed
• Powerful, relatively invisible form of propaganda
• Uses all the earlier techniques to frame
  discussion of policy

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Framing

• Certain arguments, possibilities, actions,
  beliefs, groups, positions are framed in.
  Others are framed out
• Certain facts/beliefs are considered relevant or
  irrelevant
• Arguments are more or less appropriate
• Narratives are said to be good explanations or
  not
• Pro-Life vs. Pro-Choice

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Tactical vs. strategic critique

• Chomsky discussed the difference between
  tactical and strategic critique
• Tactical critique accepts the goals and overall
  justification for the action, but questions
  whether the costs are too high, the solution
  effective, etc.
• Strategic critique questions the justification
  for the action, the basic assumptions underlying
  the position, the moral implications

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Chomsky on Vietnam

• Chomsky argued that the press and the
  administration engaged in tactical debate over
  Vietnam but never did the debate expand to the
  realm of strategic debate
• Johnson and Nixon were challenged as the the
  costs of the war, whether or not it could be won,
  whether we really wanted to pay the price, etc.
  They were not significantly challenged as to the
  morality of the war, whether this was really a
  case of the domino effect or whether we were
  supporting a dictatorship, etc.

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Personalization

• Though a conflict is between nations, groups,
  etc. try to define the enemy as a single person
• Hussein
• Bin Laden

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Demonization

• Once you have defined the conflict as an
  opposition to a single individual, define that
  individual in absolute, negative terms

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Nationalism

• Call upon love of country as a reason for support
  of policy
• Define being American as more important than
  anything else in the conflict
• Say that the opposition has attacked America as a
  whole, rather than an individual or group within
  the country

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