10/28/21

Zach Thomas

Propaganda Reflection

For this week's portfolio assignment, we were instructed to analyze a propaganda piece

from the World War 2 time period, then create our own advertisement that was to be specifically

focused on an aspect of the medical field.

First, with the piece of World War 2 propaganda, I witnessed exactly what I expected as I

opened the website for the first time. Having taken past history classes with units dedicated to

the second World War, I had already previously seen many pieces of World War 2 propaganda

and even recognized some of the posters, which completely explains why witnessed exactly what

I was expecting: Many patriotic and war themed advertisements that feature bold fonts and with

some colorful, and some black and white images. Despite receiving most of what I already

knew/expected, I did learn a couple of things: Many of the World War 2 propaganda posters

were directly created and/or printed and distributed by the government, and some of the posters

actually refer to and blatantly state Hitler's name or feature swastikas. In addition to what I

learned I was also surprised by some information. To start, I was surprised by what I learned, in

particular the Nazi Germany related things. I was surprised by this simply because I didn’t recall

ever seeing those symbols and words directly printed within the advertisements, and overall

wouldn’t expect them too ever be there. Another thing I was surprised by was usage of

segregation in the propaganda pieces. I just always thought that the topic of African Americans

participating in the war efforts wasn’t particularly a huge talking point back then, let alone the

main idea of several advertisements.

 When creating my propaganda piece, I chose to use Canva because of my past experience

with it during this course, and how much I enjoyed using its great features. I chose to make the

piece I did because it was the first thing that came to my mind, not because it was significant to

me in anyway. As it was required to be about some aspect of the medical field, I decided to make

mine about the entire idea of the medical field in general heading into flu season, focusing on

convincing the public to get treatment if needed. With that being said, my target audience was

meant to be the general public, or more specifically, anyone who may have the flu or just needs

treatment for a sickness. The text I used is significant because I felt that it has a welcoming vibe,

inviting people to read and understand what the ad is saying, while at the same time portraying it

in a nice manner. Finally, the colors I chose are significant because they pop, and they relate to

the stereotypical medical colors in a way, especially the blue.