This week in class we saw examples of propaganda related to World War Two. We compared Germany, Italy and the United States of America, especially focusing on moving images.
At the end of the lesson, I asked you to think about the main differences and similarities amongst the three 'propaganda styles'. I also asked you to go a step further by trying to understand why we can find these differences and similarities in propaganda styles.
Please, post 10 to 15 sentences (max lenght)commenting on the two videos we saw in class and on the U.S.A. propaganda video named 'why we fight' that you find in the right columns here together with links to the other videos.
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Thinking of the differences between the content and the design of the three videos brings to mind how teachers design coursework tailored to the learning styles represented in their classes. Lengthy reading assignments and bullet point lectures for 'Textbook Learners', photographic slide shows and videos for 'Visual Learners', and so on and so on. In the same way, it seems to me that 'Why We Fight' was designed to cater to the short attention spans and ingrained sense of superiority of American citizens with quick-cut action, passages of scripture, and footage of their monuments and mechanical achievements. For the Germans, the beauty of their homeland was presented, along with images of a unified people, with a strong and gracious leader. Suffused with the feelings of progress, dignity, and pride that the people wanted, at the time, very much to feel. Likewise, the power and presence of Mussolini, the conviction and certainty of his words combined with his physical image and the enormous hoards of people gathered to hear him, offered the Italian people the same solace. All three propaganda, but carefully targeted to the market and demographics of each nation doing the buying.
ReplyDeletePosted By: Matt Higgins
ReplyDelete'Why We Fight' gives a simplistic explanation on why America goes to war. It was not that difficult to convince people why we go to war. All the media had to do was tell people that America was going to war to defend freedom and liberty. The film implies that the German people are an inferior group of people by wanting to go to war with America solely on the idea that they have a grudge against them because of World War one. Hitler convinces the people that the German army will go to war with a common goal in mind. As history has shown us, this was nothing more than a form of brainwashing. When I finally got to hear Mussolini speak, I came to the conclusion (along with Germany and the United States) that people are not only influenced by a person's words, but also by their surroundings. When many many people believe in something that a leader is saying, most likely many more people will also believe in the cause, because it is what is popular, and it is what people are surrounded by.
it is interesting to think about how these three styles of propaganda differ. they definitely set out to cater to the needs of their audiences. the u.s. propaganda has serious religious undertones and the blatant reoccuring theme of freedom, reminding the citizens of the principles their country was fonded on. the german film focused heavily on hitler addressing his people. he had impressive public speaking skills and the movie played up how much he set out to unify his people and bring about the progress they all desired. in the italian film, the scenes of all the masses of people in different cities were powerful in displaying how unified the nation was. they took comfort in having mussolini as a leader and depended on his every word.
ReplyDelete-rachel hatch
All war propaganda is similar in the fact that it is used to sway the opinions of a specific group of people to believe one thing or another, so I feel it is more important to focus on the differences. There are several differences between the American propaganda and the ones seen from Europe during World War II. The main difference that I saw was that the European videos tended to put leaders and public officials in touch with the people. They focused on connecting with the public and building a trust that whatever they did was correct and honorable. The American videos used many of the same tactics as in World War I. For example, the United States propaganda focused on portraying the enemies in a negative light. This, in turn, made the United States seem like victims and defenders of freedom and justice. The European videos didn’t try to play this role, but instead focused on strength. The American propaganda played on its people’s fear to manipulate them, while the European propaganda tried to portray honor in war. I feel as if the differences were mainly caused by political structure. The supreme leaders in Europe (Hitler and Mussolini) didn’t need people’s permission to fight a war. If someone stood out against it, the protestor would be punished. In a democracy such as America, it is not so simple to tell the people what to do. In order to receive backing in a war such as this one, they have to manipulate and persuade people to gather the population together in favor of war.
ReplyDelete-Chelsea Hoekstra
The German video had the best quality out of all three and looked very professional and almost like a documentary that you would see today. It was very powerful because it showed how much influence that Hitler held over the Germans. Any German watching this documentary at that time would have been impressed by the vast amount of people who came to see Hitler and who were clearly extremely excited to see him. The Italian documentary also portrayed Mussolini as someone who everyone listens to and greatly admires. The amount of people who showed up to listen to him speak was astounding. The way that the video showed how people in cities all over Italy gathered in mass amounts to listen to him portrayed Italy as a united country under this one man. The American video was different from the other two because it did not feature a leader speaking to his people. The video aimed to show Americans that the world was divided into "us and them," with us being the free and them being the slave. It wanted the American public to believe that by entering the war, they were fighting for democracy and freedom and saving people from evil leaders. Most Americans probably believed the video since it was endorsed by the government and featured lots of footage of destruction by the other side.
ReplyDeleteThe U.S.A. propaganda video ‘Why We Fight’ is basically a showing of all the reasons we must fight to savor the freedoms set fourth in our Bill of Rights. It’s a reiteration of all the things we would lose if we did not enter the war and bring down the tyrants in Europe. From the basic freedoms of speech to the right of due process, these freedoms had been vanquished in Hitler’s Europe, those who stood apart or against the Third Reich were to be killed by the SS without the possibility of trial. The implications of the film were to alert the free people of America that freedom was only free if it was fought for, thus the idea of staying out of the war was simply impossible, for it would come one day no matter what. The film characterized American children against those of Germany, Italy and Japan that they were all being taught to kill and the theories of war whereas the John Doe’s children of America were learning to grow up through playing and life experience of peace. Looking deeper it’s basically saying that we need to protect out lives and culture to not be destroyed and ultimately replaced. We must fight to save what we built on American soil.
ReplyDelete-Matt Borowick
The Italian, German, and American propaganda films of World War II are excellent historical references when analyzing the perspectives of people under various government systems. The style of each film reflects the motives of the regime or government during that era. Leni Reifenstahl’s “Triumph of the Will” keeps tight focus on what German’s viewed as important to their culture. The film is in constant transition between artistic shots of German land, architecture, and people. The Italian Fascist propaganda film is similar in that it concentrates only on Italy its success, completely avoiding any reference to other nations. It is easier for these regimes to project the illusion of dominance through the message “because we are right” rather than “because they are wrong”. Frank Capra’s film “Why We Fight” presents an equal amount of both arguments. Capra’s formula plays feelings of fear and hatred towards the enemy against ones of sympathy for the brutalized Allies and pride in American values. The two European films place a strong emphasis on large crowds rallying in settings of historical significance to their country. These images validate the regimes as entities being embraced by their homeland, as if the ancient structures welcome their presence. As a nation that has had less time to mature, America’s appeal does not lie within its man-made physical brilliance. Instead, Capra captures the feeling of patriotism through symbolism and a repetition of references detailing the morals on which America was founded.
ReplyDeleteElizabeth Sobka
Each propaganda film worked similarly in convincing their people that to take part in the war was best for their country. Each film also swayed the emotions of the people for each respective country. In this way, each film had the general mechanisms of propaganda. However, each country went about their message differently. They each had their own style. The USA's documentary "Why We Fight" appealed to the ideals that the USA represents. Americans must fight to protect the ideals of freedom and liberty against their oppressive enemies. They rallied around their ideology. The German film mainly focused on their leader, Hitler. They focused on his speeches and general charisma. The Germans rallied around their powerful leader instead of their nations ideals. Finally, the Italians showed a speech of their leader, Mussolini, but instead of focusing on him, they focused on the crowds of people, who filled piazzas around Italy intent on listening to their leader. The Italians focused on their national unity. Thus, all three films focused on swaying their people toward the brink of war, they went about spreading their message in different ways.
ReplyDelete-Zach Sullivan-Pickett
Kasey o'Dea
ReplyDeleteThe three different propaganda videos that we were presented with are all similar in their motives behind production. However, there is an obvious message that is specific to each audience in the different clips. "Why we Fight" is created for the purpose of explaining to Americans why we entered the war in the first place. The focus throughout the entire video is about preserving our freedom and protecting our rights. This shows one of the major priorities of American citizens. Explaining this as our our motive for war does a good job of convincing people that fighting is necessary. The Nazi propaganda was very well planned and it shows the strong sense of support for the Nazi Regime. Not only are the words powerful, but the images of people crowding around and cheering displays such a powerful message. The same theme was portrayed with Mussolini. Both the Italian and German films focused on the people and their support of the regimes in power. They were very persuasive in that they showed the popularity of both the Nazi's and Fascist's in power.
Sammy Rojas
ReplyDeleteThe media depicted in each country, America, Germany, and Italy, is not only utilized to convince the public to support governmental decisions, its messages all seem to be shaped to play to the nature and ideologies of each type of population. These forms of propaganda are an interesting inside look as to what each population’s perspectives were during these times of war; the American video ‘Why We Fight’ illustrates that American people must support the war in order to defend the natural rights promised within the BOR in countries abroad; a fight for freedom. They demonize their enemies portraying them as horrific figures that torture children, rape women, and kill innocent civilians. These messages are the beginning stages of ideals that still resonate within our country today-making the world safe for democracy. In the German and Italian videos however, the two leaders, Hitler and Mussolini, seemed to be almost talking down to their populations. Although, the public may have supported these two figures, the videos showed these dictators simply talking to the public and informing them of their decisions. Although support was a goal, it didn’t seem that it was essentially necessary because of the power these governments already had. This also touches upon a similarity between the three- although, the American government needs public support, they do not necessary present the country with all the facts so that they alone can make educated decisions as to where their support lies. The government and military censor journalists and the press to convey specific ideas, images, and messages to the public. Therefore, even though the American public is getting excited of their fight for freedom and democracy, their own government is manipulating information and in some cases is essentially lying to get what they want.
After looking at the three examples, it can be seen that even though the propaganda videos differ in style-it remains just a divergence of form-they converged in their strategy and in their line of purpose. Their strategy was to use nationalism and the values of their time as mechanisms to appeal to their public for the purpose of gaining the support of the masses for the war effort. The American, Italian and German propaganda dress their propaganda in the rhetoric that was needed at the time: the Americans with their usual call to defend freedom, the Italian portraying Mussolini as the charismatic leader leading the country to victory and sharing the same line with the latter, the German showed Hitler as the ultimate leader accompanied by screen shots that revered the culture of their nation. So, through this analysis, it is clear how the message was molded according to what fit better to the target society and how this was of great value to unify the masses under a same purpose and therefore, gain political power in times of war.
ReplyDelete-Patricia Lopez C.
The focus of the three separate propaganda videos clearly shows the countries status at the time. In Germany, there was a dictatorship who had full power and control. In the videos, the camera remained on Hitler almost throughout, the only times it would be on something else, would be to show his followers praise him. This is very similar to Italian propaganda, where there too was a dictator. The video consists of Mussolini giving a speech and shows footage from areas all over Italy praising him as well. On the contrary, U.S.A. propaganda doesn't focus on one powerful man within the country because there is no dictator. They focus on the enemies of the war, and show footage of bombs attacking American soil, Hitler, etc. The end result of these propaganda videos were exactly what they wanted; Hitler wanted to show himself as praiseworthy, Mussolini wanted to show his respect throughout Italy, and U.S.A. wanted to show the cruelty in it's enemies to justify the war.
ReplyDelete-Alex Friedman
All government propaganda is made for the same purpose, to gain the support of their citizens. Although the propagandists may be trying to gain support for opposing sides and may use different tactics and images, they are still attempting to get their people to see what the government wants. The U.S. and Germans, although both trying to gain support for their involvement in World War II, made their videos in much different ways. "Why We Fight," the American film, shows many clips of the Germans bombing other, more helpless countries, and also shows the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor. It shows the enemies, Hitler, Mussolini, and the Japanese, and the oppression of their peoples. The whole thing is narrated with the message of American freedom. It is our obligation to spread that freedom all over the world. The German film, "Triumph des Willen," is much different. You can actually sense the Nazi dictatorship through the movie. It opens with Hitler driving down a German street and crowds of thousands of German people cheering for him. It shows the people's love and respect for their dictator. There is another clip of the Nazi army taking orders and chanting, proud to serve. One soldier yells "We are the Reich's young men." The Nazi propagandists wanted to show the people how respected and trusted Hitler was.
ReplyDelete--Grace Swock
Both Fascist parties, Germany and Italy, have similar propaganda. In Germany, the video focuses on, for an excessive amount of time, a parade praising Hitler. There are people flooding the streets cheering their dictator on, expressing their happiness that he is their leader. The Italian propaganda also focuses on Mussolini making famous speeches and shows the crowd applauding their notorious leader. America's propaganda is very different. It zooms in on reasons to fight and justifications of all the US actions during this chaotic time period. I think the difference in propaganda stems from the countries' goals. Perhaps a bit biased, I believe that Germany and Italy want their people to be on their side, to convince the people that their leaders know best and they should follow and go along, without struggle, with whatever the dictators dictate. America, however, is trying to portray the reasons for fighting, to show that they are trying to correct a wrong. They display all the wrong going on and show that America needs to take action and fix it. All 3 propaganda strategies are trying to get the people and leaders on the same side, however, their motives are for different reasons.
ReplyDeleteThe main similarity between all war propaganda regardless of where it originated from is that its purpose is to make the people aware and to get them to believe that their country is right and another country is in the wrong. However, there are plenty of differences between the propaganda. One of the biggest differences I noticed was that the European tried to portray honor and pride where as the American propaganda tried to appeal to society’s sensitive side and tried to get people to be afraid of what America could become if they didn’t enter the war. I believe this is because in Europe people listened and followed commands from Hitler and Mussolini and the ones who didn’t were punished and killed. In America, it is not as simple. One would have to manipulate the people and really make it seem that the others were wrong doing them. I also noticed in a lot of European ad’s they showed Hitler’s and Mussolini’s faces and army’s behind them. They played up power and strength. In American ad’s they tend to show symbols of American pride with the enemy destroying it or the enemy stealing the women and children.
ReplyDeleteBeth Wilzbach
Rebecca Anna Winston
ReplyDeleteBoth Fascist parties, Germany and Italy, have similar propaganda strategies. In Germany, the videos focus on, for an excessive amount of time, Hitler going through his parade, with all of his people cheering him on. This shows their loyalty and appreciation of Hitler. Similarly, in Italy, the videos zoom in on Mussolini making his famous speeches and shows the crowd covering every ounce of space. Germany and Italy focus on their dictators's success among their people. America's propaganda has a different focus. They try to justify their actions and win over their people's approval as opposed to showing that they already have it. They show all the chaos and disasters going on in the world at that time and try to express how America needs to help correct the wrongs. While all propaganda have hidden agendas, it is necessary to have at a time of winning the people's approval.
While Germany, Italy and the United States all shared the common goal of trying to rally support for the war, their propaganda strategies differed due to the intrinsic values of each country's people. Each country's message was tailored to maximize its influence. This reminded me of one of the first things you learn in any marketing class: know your target audience. What was important to these countries? For the United States the answer was undoubtedly freedom. Its propaganda focused on banding together to against the enemy protect their rights and freedom. Germany and Italy, on the other hand, played off the sense of pride in one's country. Their propaganda campaigns united the country around the leader and stressed the idea of finding honor in war. Instead of uniting around a leader, the United States united against the enemy. Most of their propaganda campaigns instilled a sense of fear in the people by painting horrendous (and sometimes fictitious) pictures of the enemy.
ReplyDelete-Lindsay O'Brien
-Ricki Maybruch
ReplyDeleteThe three examples of propaganda from each country perfectly depict the countries’ attitudes toward government and war at that time. The United States’ propaganda video focuses on America’s duty to enter the war to preserve and promote freedom. It also depicts violence committed by all of the Axis Powers, clearly advocating the idea that America could no longer avoid joining the war because it could not let the “bad guys” win. The video spends quite awhile explaining that fighting for freedom is inherent in our nation’s beliefs, and that is why Americans cannot sit back and watch while the leaders of Axis nations, Italy, Germany and Japan attempt to abolish freedom and democracy and take over the world. American propaganda during this time is very different from the propaganda of Italy and Germany, which are more similar to one another. Both feature very powerful and influential leaders, loved by all of the people in their countries. For instance, the most effective part that comes to mind after watching the Italian propaganda was the scene where thousands upon thousands of people in different Italian cities across the country were all listening to Mussolini’s speeches. It conveyed the huge influence he had, the hope he gave to the people of his country and the admiration they had for him as a leader. The Germans used a similar technique in their propaganda to portray a similar idea to the Italians’ in that it shows the love and hope the Germans have for Hitler and a brighter future for Germany. What particularly stood out to me was the admiration children seemed to have for him. The US propaganda featured no such leader; it just spoke of freedom in general. All three countries had the same goal in mind: encourage support for the war from the people of your country. But the United States went about it in a much more different way than Germany and Italy, as noted above.
The propaganda movies that we were showed in class have several similarities and several differences. The German propaganda video showed the people praising Hitler and cheering for him as he drove by. It also showed the city, land, and the people of the country supporting the war. The Italian propaganda showed in class also gave the viewer an image that the people of the country were supportive of the war. The video showed important historical places in Italy and showed crowds cheering about the war. Both of these videos are very similar because the videos were showing that the country was for war and there was nothing negative shown in either video. In the propaganda movie ‘why we fight’ was slightly different than the other two. In ‘why we fight’ the video gives American viewers of why we should go to war and showing the bad things that other countries have done to America and to other countries. ‘Why we fight’ also shows the viewer all the bad things that have happened and all the bombings and killings. It shows American’s that we really didn’t have a choice of entering the war.
ReplyDelete-abigail brigham