Prosthesis project

Research: Propaganda is a means of spreading concepts or ideals to a mass of people to either change their opinion on a matter or strengthen it. It’s been in used in many various ways throughout history, some for the good of the masses and others for personal gain. During wars, for example, many countries begin to speak to their people by using propaganda to gain their trust and support for what the government is doing. Such as when America began advertising war bonds in order to finance the military needs or how they began advertising “Uncle Sam” in order to gather more recruits. Then there are those unfortunate countries where people do not have a choice in what to believe in, their leaders force information on them basically brainwashing them into supporting their ideologies. In most cases during wars it’s a common for either side to spread propaganda bad mouthing the opposing country/enemy, which in terms of propaganda would be referred to as the “name calling” technique used solely to create an unfavorable opinion towards another subject/person/mass of people. The cold war for example, though not technically a war, presented a situation in which both the Soviet Union and the United States of America were trying to gain the support of other countries to make themselves look better while making the other country look bad in the process. In 1952, “Communism”, produced by Coronet Instructional Films, an education film made was released to schools in America to make others think of communism as a bad form of government, throughout the film there are many points in which the narrator points out Russia specifically to gain more viewers support against the Russians because it was during the times of the Cold War. Nowadays we see propaganda mostly in the form of advertisement for shows or products, the media, and political campaigns using various amounts of propaganda techniques to deliver their message to the masses. It’s interesting observing how the intent for propaganda has progressed over the years, shape-shifting as the years pass becoming elusive as it becomes something that concerns the everyday.

Bibliography

Communism. Prod. Coronet Instructional Films. 1952. Educational Film.

"PropagandaAbout Our Definitions: All Forms of a Word (noun, Verb, Etc.) Are Now Displayed

on One Page." Merriam-Webster. Merriam-Webster, 2012. Web. 18 Nov. 2012. <http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/propaganda>.
"Propaganda Techniques." Http://mason.gmu.edu. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Nov. 2012. <http://mason.gmu.edu/~amcdonal/Propaganda%20Techniques.html>.

"U.S. War Bonds." U.S. War Bonds. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Nov. 2012. <http://www.u-s-

history.com/pages/h1682.html>.

Concept: My idea for my prosthesis project is to research famous propaganda, mostly within the guide lines of American propaganda, in which it’s been used to persuade people into either changing their opinion on a subject or telling a false truth to gain the support of the masses. I plan on portraying my findings through audio recordings found on the internet and projecting the sound through a “Television Helmet” as well as passing around fliers that pertain to what the audio is saying. Personally I think that a television came to be the perfect way to present the audio because of the fact that whoever watches TV endures commercials whether or not it affects the viewer is totally up to them and it’s basically the same thing with history; one can choose to learn it or just avoid it. So by using the television I hope to create this sort of portal into the past, kind of like a short documentary, of how propaganda has been used in history by comparing the past and the present. I also want to show how easily somebody can be a victim of propaganda by using the television as a simple means of showing how TVs easily spread information to the masses, making a connection with the past to the present as we are bombarded with politics, the media, and thousands of rerunning commercials convincing consumers to purchase items. I want to show how the subject of propaganda has changed shape over time through this presentation of audio, from war time propaganda aimed at gaining people’s support for their country to commercials that are aimed to for profit focusing less on important matters at hand.

Inspiration: