The Aryan race of animals: The role played by colour in the visual semiotics of Nazi propaganda

Francesco Massimo Maria Buscemi

Risultato della ricerca: Contributo in rivistaArticolo in rivista

Abstract

This article analyses the role of colour in the representation of animals in Nazi propaganda. It demonstrates that colour, as applied to animals, was a communicational strategy of paramount relevance in setting boundaries and creating differences between the Nazis and their enemies. Drawing on propaganda studies, colour studies, and representational zoosemiotics, it semiotically investigates visual items published from 1923 to 1945. The results show that Nazi propaganda created an Aryan race of animals via colours. In fact, white animals always supported the regime’s ideologies; dark animals, conversely, very often symbolised the enemy (the Soviet Union, the Jews, and others). Semiotically, Nazi propaganda represented these animals as symbols, even though the links between signifier and signified were not shared within a community but only within the racist ideology of the Nazis.
Lingua originaleEnglish
pagine (da-a)329-350
Numero di pagine22
RivistaAmerican Journal of Semiotics
Volume2021
DOI
Stato di pubblicazionePubblicato - 2021
Pubblicato esternamente

Keywords

  • Animal studies
  • Colori
  • Colour
  • Nazi propaganda
  • Propaganda nazista
  • Semiotica
  • Semiotics
  • Spirituality
  • Spiritualità
  • Studi sugli animali
  • Zoosemiotica
  • Zoosemiotics

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