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Montgomery Library's Guide to Resources for Language and Literature.

Where is propaganda hiding?

In your entire education, possibly the most valuable skill to develop is the ability to distinguish among reliable information, biased content, and outright falsehoods, regardless of whether the source is accidentally passing on misinformation or intentionally lying. Author Ernest Hemingway and philosopher John Alexander Smith have made similar points in much stronger terms!

Propaganda is a term that attracts much attention. According to Professor Nicole Cooke from the American Library Association, “Propaganda is information that is subjective and is used primarily to influence the target audience and further an agenda, often by presenting facts selectively (perhaps lying by omission), or by using coded or suggestive messages or language to elicit an emotional response, as opposed to a rational response" (p. 4). Let's first examine where propaganda can be found.

 

Sources and Further Reading - Read about real-life examples here:

Bond, S. (2022). Facebook takes down Russian network impersonating European news outlets. NPR. 
Bond, S. (2023). Meta says Chinese, Russian influence operations are among the biggest it's taken down. NPR.
Cooke, A. N. (2018). Fake news and alternative facts: Information literacy in a post-truth era. American Library Association. 
Menn, J. (2023). Russians boasted that just 1% of fake social profiles are caught, leak shows. The Washington Post.
Menn, J., Schaffer, A., Nix, N., and Morse, C.E. (2024). Chinese propaganda accounts found by Meta still flourish on X. The Washington Post. 
Rosen, J. (2017). The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell, transcript 2/6/2017. MSNBC. 
Shahani, A. (2018). Inspired by Russia, he bought influence on Facebook. NPR.
Shane, S., and Goel, V. (2017). Fake Russian Facebook accounts bought $100,000 in political ads. New York Times. 
Tang, D. (2024). The US warns of a Chinese global disinformation campaign that could undermine peace and stability. Associate Press.

 

What counts as propaganda?

Next, let's dissect Cooke's definition using the diagram below and think about how to detect it in the wild:

 

Propaganda is basically everywhere. In fact, a large percentage of human communication meets the definition of propaganda. Whether you agree or disagree with the underlying perspectives you find in propaganda, our goal is that you at least would be able to recognize propaganda when you see it. As educators and librarians, we believe the world is better off if more people are aware of propaganda in their daily life. You might even say this whole guide, "Fact Checking and Fighting Misinformation," is a propagandistic tool, since we aim to influence your attitudes about the value of information literacy. But seriously, are there any merits to the opposing view that people are better off accepting misinformation and disinformation without critiquing it? 

 

Tools for Cutting Through Propaganda

One way to get better at detecting propaganda is to be aware of the context of media sources, which includes the biases media organizations typically exhibit and the kinds of readers they target. These biases can be multidimensional and can even vary from year to year and from topic to topic.

Here are a few tools for gaining awareness about propaganda and biased content:

  • Ground News -  this service aggregates news articles from across the Web and rates their biases. It offers free and paid-subscription services. The Blindspot tool helps users to identify their own biases and encourages them to read sources that offer more diverse perspectives.
  • Fact-checking Resources - find tips and tools for checking facts about current events.
  • AllSides - this is a research organization that seeks to strengthen democracy by analyzing information and views from across the political spectrum. Take a look at their 2023 media bias chart below.
  • Ad Fontes Media - this organization publishes an up-to-date interactive media bias chart, posted beneath the AllSides chart.

 

 

Find the original AllSides interactive media bias chart here, which allows you to click on the names of media sources to read the in-depth analyses by experts at AllSides.

 

 

Ad Fontes Media: Interactive Media Bias Chart

Find the original Ad Fontes Interactive Media Bias Chart here. It is updated regularly and allows you to zoom in and click on individual sources to read further analyses. In the screenshot of the chart below, notice that the y-axis displays the rate of Overall Source Reliability, based on originality of fact reporting, whereas the x-axis displays the rating for Left vs. Right political bias.

According to this 2024 chart, Ad Fontes rates NPR News Now, CBS Evening News, The Journal podcast, and BNO News as highly reliable sources based on the factuality of their reporting. In addition, the sources that are rated as having a middle or balanced bias include NPR News Now, The Journal podcast, and BNO News. This chart also suggests that some popular sources such as BBC, Reuters, AirForce Times, and The Economist exhibit only a slight political bias. Nonetheless, every article from a source should be critically analyzed and fact-checked when you are doing research.