The Functions of Stereotypes in Propaganda
"A leader with no followers is a guy taking a walk". Good leaders whether it be opinion or political, rarely if ever walk by themselves. The information theydisseminate more often than not leaves them with a hoard of followers that conform to their ideas or cause. The circulated information is known as propaganda. The Webster dictionary defines propaganda as, "ideas, facts, or allegations spread deliberately to further ones cause or to damage an opposing cause". Propaganda has been around for a long time; the earliest use of the word was in connection with religious missionary activity in the 16th century (Hardwood). Contemporary propaganda for the most part is information or disinformation, spread by leaders through their mouth pieces such as spokespeople or public relations firms. Contemporary propaganda is frequently created with stereotypes that can be easily understood, in order to reach the greatest number of people. Stereotypes and propaganda are like peanut butter and jam, when put together stereotypes function very well in propaganda. This essay will look at the relationship between stereotypes and propaganda, how stereotypes function in propaganda and how well they function in propaganda tactics. In other words, this essay will look at how stereotypes function in propaganda.
History has shown that stereotypes and propaganda have an exceptionally close relationship. Propaganda is most easily understood when kept simple by using stereotypes. A stereotype is a ready made image of a person or relationship that is instantly recognizable. (Roth) When these two mechanisms are paired together it results in a strong message that can be easily understood by the masses. Propagandi...
... middle of paper ...
...ment and industries that wish to broadcast propaganda" (Savich)
Works Cited
Brandon, Karen. "Protesting war, groups battle stereotypes too." Chicago Tribune 17 Jan. 2003. 17 Mar. 2004 .
Ellul, Jacques. Propaganda: The Formation of Mens Attitudes . Paris: Press, 1965. 3 -9.
Hardwood, Childs L. "Propaganda." Encarta . Redmond: Microsoft, 2003. CD-ROM.
Roth, Jen. Beyond Stereotypes . 14 July 2001. 29 Mar. 2004 .
Savich, Carl K. War,Journalism and Propaganda . 11 Jan. 2000. 19 Mar. 2004 .
Shaw, Anup . Media, Propaganda and September 11 . 26 July 2002. 27 Mar. 2004 .
Modell, John, and Timothy Haggerty. "The Social Impact of War." Annual Review of Sociology 17 (1991): 205-24. Print.
Words and images were silent weapons used by all governments involved during World War II. Wars are generally fought between soldiers, but the different ideologies often meet on the battlefield as well. The support of the people is crucial during these times since general knowledge of strength relies on numbers. Propaganda targets people’s emotions and feelings and changes people’s perception about a particular idea, people, or situation. Propaganda goes hand in hand with the art of persuasion and convincing; these tools can control and manipulate the collective minds of a massive amount of its audience.
Domhoff discusses the prevalence of labor unions in the New Deal era. In fact, by 1945, with the help of the liberal-labor alliances, union membership had increased five-fold to fifteen million in that past decade (pg. 172). However, after 1945, the liberal-labor alliances never saw a victory against corporate conservatives. Because of the corporate world’s domination of policy implementation, politicians rules time and again against labor unions because it works in corporate America’s favor. Labor unions serve as many working class Americans’ avenue into the political sphere; denying them a right to unionize is not only a fundamental violation of free speech but also morally and ethically wrong. Overall, Domhoff’s critique of wealthy politicians (primarily Republicans) is merited considering he argues empirically with statistics supporting extremely skewed voting trends against unions. Additionally, Domhoff’s argument exudes sympathy toward those less fortunate; I share Domhoff’s sentiment that is imperative we promote equality amongst classes, one way in which we should do so is through advocacy of labor
In many circles of the world, various groups of people distinguish themselves from one another through religion, language, culture, and sometimes gender. People also develop stereotypes about a particular group of people in order to identify them. However, most of the time, these stereotypes hold true for only some members of a group. Sometimes, these stereotypes are just plain misconceptions that do not even apply to the group it claims to. Stereotypes are placed on people because it is a way to easily identify what type of person or ethnicity an individual is. At one point in time, these stereotypes may have been true; however, in today’s modern society, most of these stereotypes are outdated and false, which leads them to turn into misconceptions. Usually, stereotypes are utilized to humiliate and degrade the person or group; they also do not provide any beneficial outcomes. Stereotypes focus on how a particular group acts because of the radical ideas and actions of the few, how a particular group looks, or how that group is physically lacking in some way. These stereotypes often lead to conflicts because the group does not appreciate the way it is being perceived. Seldom are the stereotypes placed on a group of people truthful and accurate. Some hardly even apply to the particular group people it claims to. It is true that how people are perceived has a big impact on how other individuals interact with them; however, people are not perceiving these groups correctly.
Nurses are the ones whom trust is placed to care for the sick, but with the growing population of chemically impaired nurses, patient care is in danger. Factors that are contributing to substance abuse among nurses need to be further explored to combat the issue and provide better quality care for patients.
This stress makes nurses vulnerable to substance abuse. Abusing substances is a coping mechanism for nurses to deal with stress (Wright et al., 2012). Being overworked due to a shortage of staff, high patient acuity, rotating shifts, being assigned to different units in a shift are just some causes of stress for a nurse. Trinkoff and Storr (as cited in National Council of State Boards of Nursing, 2011, p. 17) state that “the more adverse the schedule was, the greater the likelihood there would be substance abuse.” Nursing is an occupation where emotions tend to run high and can lead to emotional fatigue. Emotional fatigue can also be due to a strained relationship between co-workers and supervisors/managers. The emotional fatigue causes stress. Dunn (as cited in Epstein et al., 2010) pointed out that emergency room and intensive care unit nurses are more stressed than other units because they have to deal with a more demanding workload, sudden change in the pace of work and often deal with death. Therefore, nurses in these areas are more at risk to abuse substances. There are more female than male nurses in the nursing profession. Women tend to cope less with stress which leads to substance
Talbert, JeanAnne Johnson. "Substance Abuse Among Nurses." Clinical Journal Of Oncology Nursing 13.1 (2009): 17-19. Academic Search Complete. Web. 8 Dec. 2013
The basis of today’s opposition’s argument is that unions have outgrown their usefulness and can be harmful to American businesses and the economy as a whole. The opposition’s argument has some merit and supporting evidence albeit with personal and political bias.
Some of the reasons why nurses turn to substances for relief include; emotional impairment, drug use, alcoholism, and emotional abuse due to low self-esteem, overachievement, and overwork(Dunn, 2005). The environment in which a nurse works can have a great impact on how the nurse deals with the stressors of work. A nurse’s home environment can also have an effect on the nurse’s risk of substance abuse. A nurse is helping troubled family members either in a positive or negative effect. An example of a negative environment for the patient would be one in which the family is enabling the nurses addiction. On the other hand a positive environment would be if the family would be encouraging of the abuser to seek help and to reform their life in order to better sever the community and others. One of the facts that lead nurses to developing substances abuses is that nurses have a higher incidence of alcoholism in their family. Familial alcoholism leads to alcohol abuse in approximately 80% of nurses who had an alcoholic family member (Dunn,
The major concern for registered nurses regard’s the nurse’s health and well being. Safe staffing levels are continuing to become more of a problem. The U.S is expected to experience a shortage of nurses as the “Baby Boomers” age and the need for health care grows (Rossester, 2014). This shortage is causing some health organizations to work with minimal amounts of nurses. This is affecting the nurse’s ability to provide safe care due to fatigue and injury. This shortage is also resulting in a dramatic increase in the amount of mandatory overtime, which often means that nurses stray from face-to-face patient care and can produce an increase in the amount of medical errors (American Nurses Association,
Stereotypes have existed since the beginning of time in our everyday life through religion, politics and the media. Humans have the tendency to "use stereotypes in their humour, their descriptions of others, and even in their beliefs." One may believe it is possible to rid oneself of such habits; however if one looked at the regular promotions of propaganda, it would make this objective impossible. Stereotypes, however, aren't always negative; hence, this essay will discuss the negative and positive aspects of stereotypes used by propaganda. Propaganda is a force which can influence and affect everyone; bringing changes in behavior, attitudes and ones beliefs. It is also known that media impacts its viewersmodifying their judgments based on the information which they receive. Substantial amounts of stereotypes broadcasted through propaganda have similar effects. This essay will illustrate how stereotypes are generally portrayed and their function in propaganda. Also it will further reveal how successful and well stereotypes can work when used in propaganda tactics.
Stereotypes are a fixed image of all members of a culture, group, or race, usually based on limited and inaccurate information resulting from the minimal contact with these stereotyped groups. Stereotypes have many forms: people are stereotyped according to their religion, race, ethnicity, age, gender, color, or national origins. This kind of intolerance is focused on the easily observable characteristics of groups of people. In general, stereotypes reduce individuals to a rigid and inflexible image that doesn't account for the multi-dimensional nature of human beings. One example of stereotypes is the categorization of the Jews in the Elizabethan era.
Heidegger, the founder of the hermeneutic paradigm, rejected the traditional account of cultural activity as a search for universally valid foundations for human action and knowledge. His main work, Sein und Zeit (1927), develops a holistic epistemology according to which all meaning is context-dependent and permanently anticipated from a particular horizon, perspective or background of intelligibility. The result is a powerful critique directed against the ideal of objectivity. Gadamer shares with Heidegger the hermeneutic reflections developed in Sein und Zeit and the critique of objectivity, describing the cultural activity as an endless process of "fusions of horizons." On the one hand, this is an echo of the Heideggerian holism, namely, of the thesis that all meaning depends on a particular interpretative context. On the other hand, however, this concept is an attempt to cope with the relativity of human existence and to avoid the dangers of a radical relativism. In fact, through an endless, free and unpredictable process of fusions of horizons, our personal horizon is gradually expanded and deprived of its distorting prejudices in such a way that the educative process (Bildung) consists in this multiplication of hermeneutic experiences. Gadamer succeeds therefore in presenting a non-foundationalist and non-teleological theory of culture.
Nurses are one of the most valuable resources in any healthcare organization (Longest, Rakich, & Darr, 2006). Nurses play an important role as members of the multidisciplinary healthcare teams. Nurses help organizations to achieve its mission and vision and meet its goals and objectives. Nursing care is vital to the provision of the healthcare delivery system in promoting health and wellness, preventing illness, restoring health, caring for disabled, and helping dying patients and their families (Catalano, 2006). The promotion of quality of nursing care and the safety of nursing practice takes place through nursing education and ensuring clinical practices meet evidence-based practice, accreditation, and certification requirements (Ironside,
Each nurse has a different story of how they entered the profession, but a common thread that binds all nurses is the intrinsic desire to care for people when they are at their most vulnerable. It is not surprising that nurses routinely make personal sacrifices in order to care for their patients. Many will argue that a servant’s heart is an occupational requirement of those in the nursing profession. However, the noble sacrifices that nurses make in providing care for their patients may result in poor patient care long-term. When nurses put self-care low on their priority list, they are mentally and physically compromised. If a nurse habitually neglects his/her own health, always putting patient needs above his/her own needs, an eventual