Agitprop is political propaganda, usually art or literature with the sole purpose of persuading people to believe a certain set of ideals, originally Communism. It was coined in 1935 as a blend of the Russian words agitatsiya (agitation) and propaganda, and more specifically the shortened name of the Agitation and Propaganda Section of the Communist Party.
Agitprop can be used as a noun or adjective.
Examples
“I suppose the closest it comes to, as a genre, is agitprop. Without doubt our shared aim is to get the narrative of climate change clear in people’s minds and to make them consider different types of action that they can take.” [Financial Times]
@Large: Ai Weiwei on Alcatraz, by the celebrated Chinese dissent artist Ai Weiwei, who’s no stranger to confinement and torture, himself, opened on Alcatraz recently. It’s an art-as-agitprop creation sure to raise many eyebrows. [The Star]
An earlier version of the article referred to it as “the agitprop theatre group”, misspelled the name of its director as Martin Gulyas, and said incorrectly that it had “lost its Norwegian funding”. [The Guardian]
“I’m a dyed-in-the-wool hippie,” says Wallace, who grew up devouring not only the McCarthy-bashing plot of the original Invasion of the Body Snatchers, but also the anti-advertising agitprop humor of Mad magazine. [Yahoo News]
Part drag show, part agitprop, the performance hopes to recreate the spirit of Esta Noche’s Saturday night drag shows with a little bit of politics mixed in. [Mission Local]
“When can we expect an end to such declarations by the liberal reformers whose efforts directly led to the imbalance in the economy today?” said Konstantin Syomin, host of Rossiya 24’s programme AgitProp – a Soviet term for propaganda. [Reuters]