Propaganda is a kind of social behavior influencing people’s opinions or actions by means of transmission of information. In America, people are fond of getting different kinds of news from television. So television medium becomes the important weapon of presidential campaign and the key to candidates’ success. During the campaign, candidates bear the importance of television propaganda in their minds all the time and each candidate tries his best to master television medium to propagandize his own strong points and opponent’s weak points. To some extent, television propaganda influences the candidates’ success and becomes the important power of winning voters’ support. Mastering these propaganda techniques may help candidates get support from every walk of life, and realize their dreams of becoming the President.
In the thesis, Chapter Two discusses the functions of television medium propaganda in American presidential campaign from the following three aspects: image-setting, agenda-setting, information-conveying. Chapter Three focuses on the propaganda techniques in American presidential television campaign, such as Glittering Generalities, Card Stacking, Plain Folks, Name Calling, Bandwagon, and Transferring.
In one word, this thesis analyzes the function of television medium propaganda and the main television techniques in presidential campaign, and illustrates the importance of presidential campaign propaganda. The summary of effective aspects of American presidential television campaign provides some preference to our countries’ political propaganda.
