Visual Source 20.1: Defining the Enemy

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Among the chief uses of wartime propaganda posters was to portray the enemy in the most despicable terms. German posters, for example, often depicted the country’s enemies as animals or misbehaving children, suggesting that they were something less than fully human. They usually showed Russians as alcoholics. Visual Source 20.1 is a French poster from around 1915. It pictures Germany as Thor, an ancient pagan Germanic god of thunder, who had been turned into a demonic figure as Christianity took hold in Europe. The caption at the top of the image reads: “The god Thor—the most barbaric of the barbarian divinities of old Germany.”

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Visual Source 20.1 Defining the Enemy (The Art Archive at Art Resource, NY)