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In Essence, The Fervour Of The Visual Images Used During The Propaganda ...

In essence, the fervour of the visual images used during the propaganda campaign was established both by the long history of propaganda and the use of visual imagery to disseminate a particular ideology or view this goes back to the use of religious iconography, and has been further exacerbated by the development of the printing press in the 15th century, which allowed for the greater distribution of propaganda. The 18th century saw the development of the satirical cartoon, which used more complex imagery to generate a particular opinion. The second strand I have looked at is the development of the British newspaper industry while newspapers were under governmental control until the 1850s, it can easily be argued that the shift from state interest to capitalist interest dissolved the efforts of the radical press in a manner more insidious than the direct suppression of it ever could prior to the 1850s. This change in political scenario may explain the patriotic and widespread support for the war effort during 1914-1918, along with stereotyped, racist and widespread depictions of Germans in the free press following the invasion of Belgium. The efficacy of the campaign, coupled with the lack of dissident voices in the press certainly contribute to the persuasion that the framework for the suppression of press freedoms were already in place, and that the First World War merely exposed this lack. However, the unprecedented nature of press reaction to the war, both in terms of its distribution and its effectiveness in generating public consensus raises disturbing issues that continue to be prevalent today.
Visual Imagery In The First World War: Examples of Press Usage of Stereotypes During World War One.
The beginnings of the First World War and the effects that this had upon the free press who voluntarily helped with the war effort has enormous implications concerning questions as to whether the free press established in the 1850s was a free one or not. Indeed, the level to which the British, German and American free presses adhered to state and militaristic demands to print their propaganda as well as generate their own, coupled with the devastating aftermath of the First World War in Germany and Britain typifies the problem with the mass media in generating a public consensus and failing to supply an oppositional voice in great enough force. As I have already discussed, the development of propaganda and its visual elements had been established a long time before the actual term propaganda was used to describe them. Also, the newspaper industry's supposed freedom as a result of its extrication from subtle forms of governmental censorship is also deeply dubious, and the extent and the efficiency with which newspapers supported the madness and the atrocity of the First World War compounds the importance of the study of visual imagery during this period.


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