PROPAGANDA

WHAT IS PROPAGANDA?(n.) information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote or publicize a particular political cause or point of view.

What other definitions or examples can you think of?

ELEMENTS OF NAZI PROPAGANDA

• Appeals to the “National Community” (Volksgemeinschaft)

• A union of all “Aryan” Germans

• Political strife and dissension have no place in society

• Welfare of the nation, not the individual

• Nazi propaganda played a crucial role in selling the myth to Germans who longed for unity, national pride and greatness

ELEMENTS OF NAZI PROPAGANDA

• Cult of leadership

• Idolized Hitler as one who brought stability, created jobs, and restored German greatness

• Germans were expected to pay public allegiance to the “Führer,” such as giving the Nazi salute and greeting others on the street with “Heil Hitler!”

• Faith in Hitler strengthened the bonds of national unity; non-compliance signaled dissension

“Long Live Germany!”

ELEMENTS OF NAZI PROPAGANDA

• Defining the enemy—exclusion from society

• Publicly identified groups for exclusion, incited hatred or cultivated indifference, and justified their outcast status

• The “outsiders”:

• Jews • Sinti and Roma• homosexuals• political dissidents• Germans viewed as

genetically inferior

Left: “Bolshevism without a Mask”Right: “Behind the Enemy Powers: The Jew”

ELEMENTS OF NAZI PROPAGANDA

• Deceiving the public

• Served to win over public to regime’s goals and ideology

Left: Polish poster: “Jews are lice; they cause typhus.”Right: Poster of a Communist stabbing a German soldier in the back.

ELEMENTS OF PROPAGANDA• Indoctrinating youth

• Targeted classrooms and extracurricular activities

• Emphasized that the Party was a movement of youth: dynamic, resilient, forward-looking, hopeful

LET’S ANALYZE TOGETHER.

Look at:

• Color• Symbols• Text• Images (connotations?)• Space

Use your handout on persuasive techniques and logical fallacies to aid your analysis.

“Germany’s Victory, Europe’s Freedom,” 1940s

“He is to blame for the war!”

“A New People,” 1938“The German Student: Fight for Leader and Nation”

“A chronically ill person costs the state 5.50 Reichmarks daily.”

“A healthy family can live for one day on 5.50 Reichmarks!”

From a 1938 children’s book, The Poisonous Mushroom: “Just as it is often hard to tell a toadstool from an edible mushroom, so too it is often very hard to recognize the Jew as a swindler and criminal.”

“The Jew: Inciter of War, Prolonger of War,” 1943 or 1944

WHY IS IT IMPORTANT TO TALK ABOUT PROPAGANDA?