Propaganda And Doublespeak By Donna Woolfolk Cross

In William Lutz’s essay entitled “The World of Doublespeak,” from Christopher Ricks’s and Lenonard Micheal’s anthology State of the Language, Lutz examines the art of doublespeak. This essay is meant to enlighten people on examples and different uses of doublespeak and how organizations and others use it to mislead. Lutz begins by defining doublespeak as “language which pretends to communicate but doesn’t, language which makes the bad seem good, the negative appear positive, the unpleasant attractive, or at least tolerable” (278). Specifically, people who use doublespeak pretend to be conveying a certain message while in the real sense they are doing the opposite of that. The author gives specific examples of doublespeak that affect the

The use of propaganda and double-speaking have a long history, going back to the ancient societies. Propaganda and doublespeak are the use of verbal exchange to have an effect on the emotions, attitudes, and opinions of human beings. To try to get them to accept a particular political, religious, or financial point of view, or even to start a war. It is careful manipulation of the opinions of the societies mostly by their government. In the effort to control the nation 's thought process, the government has stemmed to using mass propaganda for selling a war.

In her essay, “Propaganda: How Not to Be Bamboozled”, author Donna Woolfolk Cross explains the different types of propaganda and how it is used in the United States. The essay was first published in Speaking of Words: A Language Reader (1977). Cross defines propaganda as “simply a means of persuasion and so it can be put to work for good causes as well as bad” (247). In her article she discusses how propaganda works and explains how propaganda is used with thirteen different devices to manipulate people’s thoughts, opinions, and ideas. She uses this essay as an informative piece, giving advice on how not to be manipulated by propaganda.

Propaganda is the use of techniques to easily sway or mislead individuals. It is campaigning and convincing people with what is trying to be advertised. The word propaganda came into use in 1914 during the end of WWl but the use of propaganda actually started a very long time ago, but the term propaganda wasn’t used, there was no name for it. Propaganda is a language of power by spreading false information, shaping society’s opinion, and being able to control people.

Double-think has a huge impact on propaganda, thus being able to convince the minds of citizens two believe the following, “War is

Propaganda often receives a bad name. People believe that influencing people as negative, however “propaganda as a mere tool is no more moral or immoral than a pump handle” (Laswell pg 21). It is not until the writers of the propaganda intentionally become vicious and spread lies that it becomes

When was the last time you were exposed to propaganda? If you think it was more than a day ago, you are probably unaware of what propaganda really is. According to Donna Woolfolk Cross in “Propaganda: How not to be Bamboozled,” propaganda is “simply a means of persuasion” (149). She further notes that we are subjected daily to propaganda in one form or another as advertisers, politicians, and even our friends attempt to persuade us to use their product, vote for them, or adopt their point of view. Propaganda is usually considered in a negative sense. However, when viewing propaganda as mere persuasion, one can readily appreicate that it is

Propaganda in general is the idea of getting others to believe in one’s own beliefs. Propaganda is the “attempt to influence behavior…by affecting through the use of mass media of communications, the manner in which a mass audience perceives and ascribes meaning to the material world.”1 Propaganda was a major part of Germany’s way to brain wash people into following Hitler and his army. The theme of Hitler and Goebbels, (Paul Joseph Goebbels, was appointed Hitler’s Reichspropagandaleiter, the Nazis national director of propaganda), using propaganda, “was to merge the traditional German patriotism with Nazi ideological motifs”2, this was basically used from1919 to 1945.

The language of propaganda and doublespeak have an extended history, going back to the earliest civilizations. Propaganda and doublespeak are the use of verbal exchange to have an impact on the emotions, attitudes, and opinions of human beings. To try to get them to approve on a particular political, religious, or economic point of view, or even to start a war. It is suspicious manipulation of the opinions of the societies to a large extent by their government. In the effort to manage the nation 's thought process, the government has used the language of mass propaganda and doublespeak for selling war.

When people hear the word ‘propaganda’, a negative image automatically seems to pop up in their heads. Propaganda generally revolves around hiding the whole story with information often being provided in a biased or misleading fashion.

We live in a world of technological innovation where mass media is a major part of us today. People make assumptions on what they hear. They do not try to analyze the situation to see who is right and who is wrong, and mass media is the main source of manipulating one's mind. The concept of propaganda has changed over time. Propagandists create ideas stereotypically through the use of propaganda and use media to promote it and target people's minds to have influence on their views towards a certain group of people. These ideas create negative or positive images in the intended audience's minds. However, it is notable that the information is only the one that is exemplified through media and therefore, can be

Propaganda is a tool for manipulating and changing the opinions people. The bases of propaganda have come forth form the modes of persuasion, Ethos, Pathos and Logos.

First, one must define propaganda and since many have done so already, I shall use the Sheryl Ross model. Her model defines propaganda as “an epistemically defective message designed with the intention to persuade a socially significant group of people on behalf of a political institution, organization, or cause.”

Propaganda is performed through print, audio, and visual mass media. It is used for the promotion of the public’s activities in their life such as purchasing goods through market propaganda, and it is also found in politics, foreign affairs, and in many other fields. Most importantly propaganda is depicted in the informercialization of the news, which is connected with subliminal advertising and commercialization of public events and individual promotion such in communication websites. However, there is great debate over propaganda and persuasion that is casted in the media, which I will be elaborating in this essay.

There are two types of propaganda: sociological propaganda; the spreading of an ideology through the mass media, and political propaganda; efforts that are sponsored by governments and political groups that alter a persons’ interests. All propaganda has a direction, and the overall quality determines whether it will have a positive or negative effect over the masses. Our entire nation is a vast propaganda operational system that is greatly linked to education, consumerism and politics. A great deal of what makes up propaganda and how it is placed among the masses lies in understanding the overall emotional and physical states of these groups of people and in finding a way to draw a persons’ attention to capture their hearts, breaking down