Game Night: Propaganda Game

Join us at Forest City Gallery on Friday, May 2nd from 6-8pm for the Propaganda Game Night led by d st-amour, as part of the ADAC Canadian Art Hop.

The Propaganda Game was developed in 1958 by Lorne Greene and Robert W. Allen for the Institute for Propaganda Analysis. The game was designed as a pedagogical tool to sharpen critical thinking and media literacy in Cold War-era classrooms. It introduces players to persuasion techniques, categorizing them into specific types such as “emotional appeal,” “ambiguity,” or “technical jargon.” While framed as a board game, it serves as a structured system for identifying and naming rhetorical strategies.

Gameplay is group-based and discussion-driven. Players are presented with examples of persuasive statements, and together, they determine which propaganda technique is being used. The format allows for disagreement and conversation, encouraging analysis over correctness. In this event, groups of four players (or two guests forming a team within a group) will work through selected examples in rounds.

The game is structured around six broad categories of propaganda—such as “self-deception,” “techniques of language,” and “irrelevant appeal”—each broken down into subtypes. Players are presented with statements taken from advertising, political speech, or popular culture and are asked to identify the technique being used. The format encourages group discussion, disagreement, and debate, offering a form of cooperative critical analysis rather than competitive play.

Given the renewed urgency around information warfare, conspiracy, and mediated truth, this game offers a relevant framework for reflecting on persuasion and power. Throughout the evening, notes, impressions, and frustrations will be collected from participants with the aim of speculating on what a new game—updated for our moment—might look like. These reflections will help inform the design of a prototype for a future game.

Although now dated, the game continues to offer a practical framework for examining rhetorical manipulation. Its language and examples reflect a specific moment in North American history, but the underlying impulse—to equip people with tools to analyze persuasion—remains relevant in an age shaped by algorithmic recommendation, corporate messaging, and politicized misinformation.

d st-amour is a curator, researcher, bookmaker, editor, writer, publisher, and near librarian. They have worked in the art world for over 20 years in a range of roles, including curatorial and directorial positions at Art Metropole, the Art Gallery of Ontario, Gallery SBC in Montreal, and the Walter Phillips Gallery at the Banff Centre. Their programming includes festivals and conferences such as Volume MTL, Edition Toronto, and a range of independent workshops and symposia across Canada and internationally. They regularly lecture on the intersections of publishing and contemporary art and were a 2020 Fellow at the Banff Curatorial Institute. st-amour holds an MA in Art History from York University and is currently a Canada Graduate Scholar in Library and Information Science at Western University in London, Ontario.