2/24/20 Daniela Yevdaev Pd 5

February 24, 2020

Daniela Yevdaev Pd 5

Sophomores English 2020

Notes from the day's lesson:

Aim: How does George Orwell demonstrate the problems of propaganda?

Search up the definition of propaganda and figure out what the difference between propaganda and advertising is. Here's what the class learned:

• Propaganda -
• The spreading of ideas info or rumor for the purpose of helping or injuring an institution, a cause or a person
• Ideas, facts, or allegations spread deliberately to further one’s cause or to damage an opposing cause; also: a public action having such an affect
• Tries to promote ideologies and philosophies
• Advertising -
• A marketing tactic used to get people commercial products or services
• May use propaganda to get you to buy goods
• Example: only the most elite people own Birkin bags (promoting the philosophy that if you don’t own the bag then you’re not “elite”, celebrity promotion also causes you to want to buy goods to fit that “celebrity lifestyle”)

Just for clarity:

Point of view- 1st, 2nd, 3rd, person (narration)

Perspective - i think, you think, they think, etc. (ideology/opinions)

Each group was assigned a different example of propaganda and were asked to describe what it is promoting.

• Stalin: dressed in all white, symbolizing purity and innocence, making it seem like he is a hero for Russia
• Navy: shows how appealing joining the navy is that even women would want to enlist, playing on toxic masculinity - are you really a man if you aren't joining the navy because here you have a WOMAN wanting to do it so you need to do it to prove yourself
• Wake up America: everyone needs to be playing their part to help their country, it is not the time to be sleeping since there's so much for everyone to do
• Victory bond: here you have a kid begging for a bond so that it can help their future, portraying the idea that everyone really wanted a victory bond 
• Submarine service: saying that once you join the submarine service you will also have women fawning over you

What is the difference between news and propaganda? PURPOSE

• News is meant to inform while propaganda is used to persuade and promote a certain belief.
• Two types of propaganda: white and black
• White is true (based off news) while black is a lie (used to discredit an opposing cause)

** Remember: news can be used and manipulated in propaganda; but propaganda should never be used in the news**

Group work

Find examples of political propaganda in multiple perspectives that cover the same topic.

"German student"
"fight for the leader and the people"
joining the youth camps will make you a model student
fight for what's right

do your part and join the fight to stop the axis powers

Does the USA currently use any propaganda? What effect does this awareness have?

• Yes, an example could be slogans of candidates such as Trump's "Make America Great Again" promoting the belief that if you vote for him and he becomes president, he will improve the country greatly. Being aware of this can help prevent people from automatically just believing this type of media without second guessing it first. 

How is propaganda being used in Animal Farm? What is Orwell’s commentary on it?

• The pig called Squealer runs around making sure that everybody knows how much work and effort Napoleon is putting in to make sure that the farm keeps running, how everything that their leader is doing is to benefit them. Orwell is making fun of it by making it blatantly obvious that the pig is spreading lies to the rest of the animals but none of them seem to know any wiser. He makes an allegory to Stalin's own personal press, calling him out on his lies.

Reflection:

In today's lesson the class learned the difference between news, advertising, and propaganda while keeping a focus on learning the problems that arise when propaganda is spread. The reason behind this lesson is to relate back to George Orwell's example of propaganda in his work, Animal Farm. We just finished reading a scene where a character called Squealer spreads lies to the rest of the farm to put their leader in a better light. This is a nice simplified demonstration of how propaganda works and this lesson was able to teach us how this relates back to actual political propaganda and its problems. Using what we learned today, I can be aware of the media that I consume so that I will be able to properly differentiate between what is informational news and what is persuasive propaganda.