Agitprop, Part 0
“Lendiz: The books on all spheres of
knowledge”, Alexander Rodchenko, 1925
Agitprop
The SACP by its Constitution is supposed to “educate, organise
and mobilise”. These three terms can be put together into one: “Agitate”.
The word “Propaganda”
came into wide use after the “Congregatio
de Propaganda Fide” (Latin for “congregation for the propagation of the
faith”) was set up by the Catholic Church in Rome in 1622. Its business was to
“propagate”, and what that means is:
“Cause to grow in numbers or amount; extend
the bounds of; spread (especially an idea, practice, etc.) from place to place.
Grow more widespread or numerous, increase, spread.
“Extend the action or operation of; transmit
(motion, light, sound, etc.) in some direction or through some medium. Be
transmitted, travel.”
These words quoted from the big (“New Shorter”, 2-Volume)
Oxford Dictionary can help to describe what we mean by Propaganda, in this
course.
Agitational
Propaganda (Agitprop for short) is what this course is about. It is a
practical course. It is about means, and arts. It starts with writing, but the
course is saying that human expression and communication takes many forms, and
we use all of them, and try to use them well.
The ten parts of the course will be:
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1
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Writing
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2
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Print on Paper
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3
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Graphic
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4
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Information
Technology
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5
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Performance
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6
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Fabric
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7
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Public
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8
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Industrial
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9
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Broadcast
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10
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Installation
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Original texts
It is
likely that in this course, in its first iteration, we will have a lot fewer
“original texts” than has been the case in the previous fourteen Communist
University courses.
Therefore,
what we will do is to compile the “Openings to Discussion” into a booklet each
week and send it out with the final post. This weekly booklet will then be used
as the hard-copy document for discussion in live sessions. If there are
original texts, they will also be sent.
- To download any of the CU courses in PDF files please click here.
