Abstract:
The war propaganda campaign during the First World War from 1914- 1918 is known as the
first war in history, in which both the allies and the axis have devoted massive resources to
producing propaganda systematically, in which mass media and propaganda have played a
significant role in sustaining military campaign. Numerous print media, such as postcards,
posters, comics, cartoons, Flyers, Newspapers, Paintings and magazines were published to keep
the civilians informed about the occurring in the battlefield, while maintaining their morale and
generating interest in war savings, loans and bonds while recruiting soldiers to the military. The
role of women changed dramatically with the starting of the war, by recruiting them in to the
jobs vacated by the men. With this Transformation of roles, women were used in war
propaganda as victims of rape, torture and violence, as homemakers, as national allegories and
as active participants of war applying moral and sexual pressure on men to be recruited in to
the regiments. The Objective of this research is to examine the motifs of both allies and axis
behind the portrayal of women in the graphic art war propaganda of the world war one. This
research is based on selected war posters from both the allies and axis and on comparing how
women were used in posters by each nation to achieve their military goals. According to the
findings of the research, it was evident, that the propaganda campaign was subjected to a
specific audience of the society. Therefore, the role of the women used in posters and the
slogans were selected carefully, to appall the conscience of the audience with numerous subject
matters, in which the most common were exploiting the mistakes made by the enemy, justifying
war to the civilians, recruitment to the army forces, rewarding the sacrifices of the soldiers and
conjuring up the feelings of required patriotism.
