Sure, there's a crude message that propaganda is trying to get across. But like poetry, when you know how to read it, propaganda contains lots of more subtle messages that you might not see at first glance. This week: examples, big and small, from around the world.
Guerrilla Marketing
Producer Sean Cole tells the story of a brand of war propaganda developed in Colombia that was so ambitious and ornate, it's almost hard to believe. You can watch Jose Miguel Sokoloff's TED talk, which is featured in the story, here. (15 1/2 minutes)
Not Our Town
When Jon Mooallem went to see his six-year-old daughter in a musical at her after-school program, he didn't know what to expect. But it certainly was not the performance saw. The musical was created by Children's After School Arts. (15 minutes)
The Spy Who Didn't Know She Was A Spy
On September 29th a medical researcher in Philadelphia fired off a simple, well-meaning tweet, and then barely thought twice about it. Little did she know that by doing that, she was perpetrating covert propaganda on behalf of the U.S. government. Ira explains. (7 1/2 minutes)
Party On!
Evan Osnos, a staff writer for the New Yorker who for years reported on China, tells producer Nancy Updike about an incredibly shrewd and successful propaganda campaign that hinged on two words. Evan's book about China, Age of Ambition: Chasing Fortune, Truth, and Faith in the New China, won the national book award in 2014. (12 1/2 minutes)
Related
If you enjoyed this episode, you may like these
Act Five: U.s.a., Me-s.a.
Ira talks with Chicago Public Radio reporter Shirley Jahad about white Chicagoans and Arab-American Chicagoans facing off, each side waving American flags and shouting "U.S.A."...and how each means very different things when they do it.
Act One: The Disappearance
Genevieve Jurgensen and her husband Laurent lost their two daughters—Elise and Mathilde—at the ages of 4 and 7.
Act Two: Sleep's Tiniest Enemies
This American Life producers Nancy Updike and Robyn Semien report on critters that can kill sleep: cockroaches and bedbugs.
Staff Recommendations
Meet the Pros
The story of one man's journey from obscurity to international professional celebrity.
Sissies
A family where the father was one kind of sissy and the son was another kind, and how the family was destroyed despite the fact that no one wanted it to be.