Propaganda

Nathan Crick is a professor in the Department of Communication at Texas A&M University, USA. His recent books include The Routledge Handbook of Rhetoric and Power (Routledge, 2024), Rhetorical Public Speaking, 4th edition (Routledge, 2022), and The Rhetoric of Social Movements (Routledge, 2020).

“Nathan Crick’s approach to the mechanics of propaganda is a fresh contribution to the conversation and will doubtless be quite useful as students learn how to critically analyze the bewildering propaganda appeals in which we are all immersed.”James J. Kimble, Seton Hall University, USA“‘Propaganda’ has been a term of abuse for over a century—information we don’t like that doesn’t seem fair. But as this book demonstrates, propaganda has a distinct meaning, history, and practices related to mass persuasion. In an era of unrelenting mass persuasion, we need this book more than ever.” Ryan Skinnell, San José State University, USA “Nathan Crick’s Propaganda: The Basics is good to its word: it gets down to the basics of this modern mode of mass communication, and it offers a revaluation of the term on behalf of citizens becoming more critical consumers and more productive creators of public messages. Although keenly aware of the dangers all too present in democracies today, Crick provides both a tool kit and an argument for political speech that can be both ethical and effective.”Robert Hariman, Northwestern University, USA

• 1. What Is Propaganda? 2. The Formation of Motive 3. Creating Events 4. Crafting Identity 5. Simplifying Ideas 6. Arousing Passions 7. Will Propaganda Save Us or Destroy Us?