Video of the conference can be found here: http://media.ruc.dk/2012-10-05_3/iframe2.html
Title: The Committee on Public Information: Persuading a nation to war
Paper Abstract: This paper discusses findings from an archival case study of the Committee on Public Information about how the cultural systems of propaganda, journalism and popular culture can be used in persuading, informing and entertaining of audiences to galvanize support for a cause. The Committee on Public Information (CPI) was an American government propaganda organisation credited with successfully mobilizing public opinion to gain support to enter World War I. The CPI had over twenty divisions. This study analyses three: the Division of News, composed of newspapermen to gain media support; the Four Minute Men, a national group of rhetorical orators who spoke at motion-picture houses; and the Division of Pictorial Publicity, a group of famous illustrators who created the only colour images available of the war.
A variety of opposed stakeholders, including immigrants of Irish and German descent, women who were considered dangerous pacifists, and businessmen whose industries were needed to generate war goods, were addressed through a transmedia campaign. Strategies of the campaign included media relations, endorsements by public figures and celebrities, and inducing citizen-to-citizen peer pressure at a local level, and social interaction on a local, state and national level. The CPI’s propaganda campaign utilized all media forms available at that time including the tactics of speeches, posters, buttons, music, school competitions, and fashion. The highly successful campaign rallied the nation to arms and war work, and convinced Americans to change their daily lives in order to ration war goods and financially support the war.
The study contributes to understanding how the expectations of persuasion, truth and amusement relate to each other when mediated in cultural systems. An analysis using close reading of archival documents and Yuri Lotman’s concept of the semiosphere found that media credibility and transmedia bridged a gap between disparate cultural systems to create a successful campaign.
Video of the conference can be found here: http://media.ruc.dk/2012-10-05_3/iframe2.html
Title: The Committee on Public Information: Persuading a nation to war
Paper Abstract: This paper discusses findings from an archival case study of the Committee on Public Information about how the cultural systems of propaganda, journalism and popular culture can be used in persuading, informing and entertaining of audiences to galvanize support for a cause. The Committee on Public Information (CPI) was an American government propaganda organisation credited with successfully mobilizing public opinion to gain support to enter World War I. The CPI had over twenty divisions. This study analyses three: the Division of News, composed of newspapermen to gain media support; the Four Minute Men, a national group of rhetorical orators who spoke at motion-picture houses; and the Division of Pictorial Publicity, a group of famous illustrators who created the only colour images available of the war.
A variety of opposed stakeholders, including immigrants of Irish and German descent, women who were considered dangerous pacifists, and businessmen whose industries were needed to generate war goods, were addressed through a transmedia campaign. Strategies of the campaign included media relations, endorsements by public figures and celebrities, and inducing citizen-to-citizen peer pressure at a local level, and social interaction on a local, state and national level. The CPI’s propaganda campaign utilized all media forms available at that time including the tactics of speeches, posters, buttons, music, school competitions, and fashion. The highly successful campaign rallied the nation to arms and war work, and convinced Americans to change their daily lives in order to ration war goods and financially support the war.
The study contributes to understanding how the expectations of persuasion, truth and amusement relate to each other when mediated in cultural systems. An analysis using close reading of archival documents and Yuri Lotman’s concept of the semiosphere found that media credibility and transmedia bridged a gap between disparate cultural systems to create a successful campaign.
