Semiotic aspects and psychophysiological effects of totalitarian symbols: nazi and communist flags
international Communist movement. The red star be SEMIOTIC ASPECTS AND PSYCHOPHYSIOLOGICAL EFFECTS OF came official state and army emblem in many Communist countries. In Communist symbolism, the TOTALITARIAN SYMBOLS: five points of the red star, just as the «five fingers above NAZI AND COMMUNIST FLAGS myself* in the salute of Communist youth movements, Prof. Dr. Wolfgang G. Jilek referred to the five continents of the world in which Marxism-Leninism would finally triumph. The interpre The Semantic Metamorphosis of Symbols tation of the red star in Communist poetry and art as •Star of the Earth, Star of Life* (Johannes R. Becher, l.I Red Flag Communist poet laureate and culture minister of the A plain red flag or standard, to which designs were GDR), as lithe star beaming towards mankind's salvation sometimes added, was until recently shown by some as in a classless society*, points to the eschatological Arab sultanates in the tradition of the early Islamic Khariji nature of CommunismL movement, and was in Europe since Roman and early mediaeval times a symbol of monarchic sovereignty 1.3 Hammer and Sickle standing for the legitimate rulers supreme authority The hammer has in many cultures been associated over life and death, such as since Charlemagne the with divine power, especially as an attribute of thunder «Oriflamme» of French kings and the «Blutbanner» of gods, e.g. Thor in Norse mythology. The sickle had in German emperors. During the French Revolution the antiquity the connotation of mortality as instrument of red flag became a symbol of the ‘sovereignty of the Death the Reaper; in Christian tradition it symbolises the people* in rebellion against royalty and aristocrats. Day of Judgement. Although hammer and sickle in offi In the course of the 19‘^ century it was adopted by cial Communist interpretation and according to the socialist movements as the signal of international class Soviet constitution represent the «emblems of peaceful struggle. The red flag of proletarian revolution appea labour* as the union of workers and peasants. red first in Paris in 1832T In 1848 red flags were flown Communist propaganda illustrations have sometimes by radical revolutionaries in France and Germany. depicted hammer and sickle as weapons directed When the h' International was founded in 1864, against «class enemies*, counterrevolutionaries or other Friedrich Engels proclaimed the red flag the banner of hate figures. As Communist emblems these tools have the world proletariat. The short-lived Commune of Paris therefore retained, perhaps not without intention, of 1871 made the red flag an official government sym some of the threatening aspects they previously pos bol for the first time. In Russia, the red flag was first sessed in the hands of gods of thunder and final Judge shown in 1876 by the revolutionary society «Earth and ment, inspiring fear at least on an unconscious level. Freedom*. During the Russian revolutions of 1905 and 1917, red flags soon became identified with the 1.4 Swastika Bolsheviks. German communist propaganda literature, The swastika (Sanskrit: «sign of good luck*), or ‘hoo on the authority of Engels' ‘Bauernkrieg*, extended the ked cross*, can be rendered in a static form, i.e. with history of the red flag as a symbol of revolutionary class all arms in horizontal or vertical position, either right- struggle back to the peasant wars of early 1B'” century handed or left-handed. It can also be rendered in a Germany (however, the most common symbol of the quasi-moving tilted form, i.e. with a 45 degree inclina peasant revolt was the «Bundschuh» banner). The rebel tion of the arms from the horizontal or vertical position, lious peasants were romanticised in both Communist in heraldic terms a «crux gammata couped in saltire*. and Nazi literature and lyrics. The swastika is one of the oldest symbols of mankind Red was also the dominant colour element in the Nazi and has been found by archaeologists and historians as fiag, from 1935 to 1945 the official national flag of the religious-philosophical symbol in nearly every culture, German Reich. Adolf Flitler was deeply impressed by the including those of Semitic racesT It is also one of the «sea of red flags, red bands and red flowers* he saw at pre-eminent symbols of Hinduism, associated with a Marxist mass rally in Berlin 1919. He wrote: «l myself several gods of the Hindu pantheonh To Buddhists the could feel and understand how easily the man in the swastika is also a venerated symbol, standing for the street succumbs to the suggestive spell of such a gran heart and the doctrine of the Buddha. Throughout Asia diose spectacleiiT This early experience may well have the swastika is held in esteem as an auspicious sign of inspired Hitler to later consider red as prominent colour good augury in spiritual, health and economic matters in the Nazi flag. The dominant red flag background was For this reason the swastika has recently been adopted equally important to the psycho-physiological efficacy as an election emblem in Nepal by none other than the of Nazi propaganda and of the «agitprop» (agitation Communist Party, in conjunction with hammer and sick and propaganda) of the Communists. le. Without intended racist connotation the swastika has served as military aircraft insignia for Finland and Latvia; 1.2 Red Star a swastika flag flew over the Tule Republic of the Cuna The star has since Sumerian times been associated Amerindians in Panama ca. 1925-1930 (Don Healy, flag with celestial powers. In Judaeo-Christian tradition it collection). The Austrian born psychoanalyst, antifascist has eschatological significance as an attribute of pro and later also anticommunist Wilhelm Reich tried to phets and of the Messiah (Star of Bethlehem); it is also document the swastika as universal symbol of sexual indicative of sainthood, e.g.* the red star of St, union and therefore strongly affecting the unconscious'. Dominicus. This ancient religious symbol was adopted In the swastika's several thousand years of existence by the Bolsheviks in 1917 and soon afterwards by the as a symbol it was not until the end of the 19" and FAHNEN FLAGS DRAPEAUX (Proceedings of the 15'f’ ICV, Zurich, 1993)
beginning of the 20* century that it was assigned the The Configurational Metamorphosis of Symbols meaning of representing the postulated superiority of so-called Nordic-Germanic or «Aryan» races over the rest 2.1 Hammer and Sickle of mankind. This new meaning was given to the swas The final adoption of hammer and sickle in its pre tika not by actual Scandinavian or Indo-Aryan people sent configuration by Communism came at a relatively but by preachers of pan-Germanic, antisemitic, and late stage of the Bolshevik revolution. Hammer and sick «v6lkisch» ideas. These notions had been propagated le were preceded by hammer and plough. The peasant's by Comte de Gobineau and Houston S. Chamberlain in plough superimposed on the worker's hammer, both Western Europe and became fashionable among mar inserted in the five-pointed red star, was the first emblem ginal intellectuals in Germany and Austria at the turn of of the Red Army until 1922" when it was replaced by the century. German and Austrian «ariosophists» used a red star with hammer and sickle, by order of the the swastika as the hallmark of their racism, usually in Revolutionary Military Council of 13 April 1922. The a static right-handed form®. hammer and plough emblem, with or without star, Among the many preachers of semi-occult pan- adorned flags of the Red Army units and ships in the Germanic lore of that era, some promulgated a clearly early years of the Russian civil war (Fig. I) The red star proto-Nazi ideology In their sectarian groups and in with hammer and plough was also the official emblem their writings. Among those who popularised the swas of the Hungarian Soviet Republic in I9I9'T From the tika as a so-called «Aryan» symbol were some who exer point of view of graphic presentation and visual recog ted considerable influence on later Nazi ideologues: nition, the hammer and plough combination was not Guido von List (1848-1919), founder of the «High well suited to serve as a propaganda signal Armanen Order*; Joerg Lanz won Liebenfels* In June 1918 an initial design of the state seal of the (1874-1954), apostate Cistercian monk, publisher of Russian Soviet Republic featuring hammer and sickle the racist «Ostara» magazine and originator of theArio- with an upright sword [Fig. 2), also a rather complex Christian «New Templar Order*; Theodor Fritsch and static device, was according to the eyewitness (1852-1932), editor of the antisemitic paper «Der Bontch-Bruyevich selected by Vladimir Ilyich Lenin as Hammer* and main figure in the secretive Germanic too militaristic. Lenin's letter of 26 July 1918 to the Order lodges; «Baron» Rudolf von Sebottendorf, alias German revolutionary Clara Zetkin contains an offprint Adam Alfred Glauer (1875-1945), naturalised Ottoman of this design, it was later published by Dr. Ottfried subject, organiser of the ultra-nationalist ,«Thule Society* Neubecker'L Various combinations of hammer and sick which adopted as emblem a Germanic round shield le were then in use on Soviet flags. Two of the earlier with static curved-hook swastika, superimposed on a designs of hammer and sickle survived in the emblems vertical sword. Sebottendorf's claim in 1933 of having of the Georgian and Uzbek Soviet Republics. The final directly inspired Nazi ideas and symbols appears histo configuration of hammer and sickle for the flag of the rically justified but was less than welcome to the new Soviet Union was found by combining the two tools in •Fuhrer*. The «Baron» relates in his soon suppressed the form of almost a circle, a modification of Dubasov's book that in 1919 the «Thule Society* headquarters in design accepted for the state arms of the USSR in 1923. Munich, also visited by later Nazi leaders including The rounded hammer and sickle device created a dyna Hitler, were adorned with swastikas; the rostrum was mic impression and was subsequently introduced by draped with a red flag captured from the Bavarian «Rate several Communist parties outside the Soviet Union (Soviet) Republik* into which a swastika on a white field who had displayed other forms of hammer and sickle had been sewn by a female Thule member’. before. As symbol of nationalist reaction against leftist revo lution, a static right-handed swastika emblem was worn 2.2 Swastika by some German «Frelkorps» 1919-1920, notably by The first public hoisting of a swastika flag as racist the ((Brigade Erhardt* (on steel helmets) and by the ((Aryan* symbol took place on Christmas Day 1907 at ((Freikorps Rossbach* (on the regimental standard). The Werfenstein Castle in Austria. Although aesthetically White Guards of the ((Mad Baron* von Ungern- attractive, the yellow flag with a red static swastika sur Sternberg, a member of the ((Thule Society* who ruled rounded by four blue fleurs-de-lys which stood for eli in Mongolia 1919/20, also featured the swastika on tist racial purity, was hardly the model of a stimulating their uniforms and it appeared on Mongolian postage signal to be used in modern political mass propaganda stamps of the era - as a Buddhist or a proto-Nazi symbol? nor was that the intention of the secretive ((New Templar In Germany at that time members of the ((Thule Order* whose founder, the former Cistercian monk Lanz Society* and ex ((Freikorps* officers introduced the swas ((Von Liebenfels*, had designed this flag and hoisted it tika emblem to the ((Party of German Socialists* on his newly acquired castle ruin". The ((viPIkisch* swa (Deutsch-Sozialistische Partei) and to the ((German stika was sometimes displayed by radical German natio Workers' Party* (Deutsche Arbeiter-Partei), which mer nalists on the imperial black-white-red flag, a rather ged in 1920 - from then on known as ((National Socialist clumsy device for a propaganda signal. Hitler had alrea German Workers' Party*, NSDAR or Nazi Party. The Nazi dy as a young man known ((Aryan* swastika-symbols Party monopolised the once universal sun symbol of from his avid reading of racist pamphlets such as Lanz' mankind and proclaimed it to stand for the ((mission of ((Ostara* magazine. Later Hitler was an enthusiastic struggle for the victory of Aryan man* and as the ((sym witness of the ((Brigade Erhardt* marching through bol of organic Germanic truth*'®. To back up the claims Munich in 1919 and through Berlin in 1920 with their of their leaders, Nazi historians produced ((evidence* of battle song ((Swastika on the helmet, black-white-red the ((Nordic-Indogermanic* origin of the swastika. band*. He also had close contacts with Thule members Semiotic aspects and psychophysiological effects of totalitarian symbols: nazi and communist flags who in 1919 displayed the swastika emblem, calling it que physiological and psychological characteristics. the future symbol of Germany. In February 1920 the Red is the colour of blood and fire, its immediate recog Austrian Nazi leader Dr. Walter Riehl designed a party nition has survival value; consequently red is the first flag with a black swastika on white background colour to which infants react and which they recognise. All these swastika emblems lacked the unique com Red is therefore ideally suited for signal purposes and bination of colour and form elements of the final Nazi animal blood may have been the earliest sign paint used flag for which Hitler claimed authorship in «Mein by man'*. According to the positive and negative as Kampf». But Hitler did not create this fiag; it was first pects of blood and fire the perception of their colour, red, designed by Dr. Friedrich Krohn, a dentist from will elicit ambivalent emotions in humans but its imme Starnberg near Munich who had already in May 1919 diate effect on the central nervous system is one of sti submitted a memoir to the German Workers Party (DAP) mulation, excitation and arousal with transient increase suggesting the swastika as symbol of national socialism. of blood pressure and pulse rate. To the observer red On 20 May 1920 Krohn unfolded the design which objects appear closer than objects of other colours at became the Nazi flag at the foundation meeting of the the same distance. Under red light, things appear lon Starnberg branch of the party and on 21 May 1920 it ger and bigger. Red illuminated weights are judged as was adopted as official flag of the Nazi party by the exe heavier than weights under blue-green light. One can cutive committee in Munich, also with Hitler's vote. In say that «red is to the human eye the most salient of summer 1920 Hitler depicted the new flag in his sketch colour experiences*'’. of a future Nazi storm trooper [Fig. 3] who looks very It is therefore understandable that all languages much like a soldier of the «Brigade Erhardt»“. As in which have basic colour terms beyond mere signifiers Hitler's drawing, most Nazi flags of 1920-22 featured a for «black» (dark hues) and «white» (light hues), have a standing swastika. The static swastika continued on the term for red even if they have no terms for any other SA and SS standards which were introduced in 1922, colour, as is known from the «World Colour Survey* patterned after the Italian fascist model, and on the «tra- inaugurated by Berlin and Kay, Their ethnographic- dition flags* of some SS units. In the official Nazi flag linguistic research suggests a positive correlation be the static swastika was replaced by a tilted version. The tween the technoiogical development and complexity dynamic tilting of the swastika (Fig. 4] may be credited of a culture and the complexity of its colour vocabulary, to Hitler (0. Neubecker, personal communication) or reflecting an evolutionary law®. It is also not surprising perhaps to Alfred Rosenberg and his Russian emigration that the terms white, biack and red are the most ancient contacts who were certainly familiar with rouble bills colour names in the development of human languages, issued under the Kerensky government 1917 showing as these colours have always been associated with the a «republicanised» Russian double eagle and a tilted primordial human experience of daylight, nocturnal right-handed swastika. darkness, blood and fire.
Psycho-physiological Properties and Effects 3.3 Perceptual Effects of Configuration and Context
Since the work of Emile Durkheim'' we know that The final forms of both swastika and hammer and symbols have no intrinsic meaning as was assumed sickle created a configuration which maximises the sig before him in the 19“’century, that the meaning of sym nal value of these symbols according to the principles bols can only be understood in their social and cultu of visual perceptual organisation, as discovered by ral context. Durkheim showed that an emblem is inten •Gestalt Psychologic**'. Specifically the «Gestalt» princi ded to express the unity of the society or social group ples of iPraegnanz* and of «Closure» apply to the con which chose that emblem as a symbol of itself; the figuration of both emblems. The results of experimen emblem is an expression of the sentiment the social tal research can be summed up in the sentence that group holds of itself and at the same time the emblem visual stimuli are perceived in a pattern of organised also serves to create this sentiment. However, some configuration («Gestalt») which is not necessarily iden emblems are better suited than others to serve this tical with the external figure causing the visual stimu intended social purpose because of their psycho-phy lation. The emergence of «Gestalt» patterns in percep siological properties based on colour and configuration tion is dominated by the overriding principle of •Praegnanz*, also known as the «law of good Gestalt*, 3.1 Relevant Anatomical which states that the emerging percept will be as praeg- and Physiological Information nant or «good» as the stimulus figure permits; it will be Recent research revealed that the «visual» part of the of the greatest possible symmetry, unity, regularity, sim brain consists of four distinct vision areas, correspon plicity, inclusiveness and continuity. ding to four parallel systems concerned with different Derived from the main «Gestalt» principle of attributes of vision: two for form, one for motion and •Praegnanz* is the principle of "Closure* which states one for colour. It will be noted that while all four vision that irregular and open wholes are apt to be perceived systems of the brain are concerned with the general as closed, so that a circular shaped figure with small perception of light, only one system is concerned with gaps tends to be seen as a complete circle. If the obser wavelength, i.e. colour, ved figure, in spite of the proximity of its parts, devia tes from the configuration of a «good Gestalt* to a 3.2 The Colour Red degree that precludes perceptual closure, the visual sti The colour red which provides the dominant back mulus will have the effect of fixating the observers atten ground for Communist and Nazi flags, has several uni tion by creating mental tension through neuronal exci- FAHNEN FLAGS DRAPEAUX (Proceedings of the 15*^* ICV, Zurich, 1993)
ration in the brain. This is precisely what happens to the thought and behaviour. In totalitarian political systems observer of the two totalitarian emblems in their final reinforcement of the conditioned response is achieved form. The visual stimulation effected by the tilted swa by constant simultaneous exposure to party symbols stika and by the rounded hammer and sickle provokes and propaganda messages in orchestrated «demon- perceptual closure and creates an impression of dyna strations# and mass marches of which the Communist mic motion [Fig. 4). However, the gaps in these nearly parades in Moscow and the Nazi «Reichsparteitag# in circular shaped, quasi rotating figures are too great to Nuremberg have become paradigms. be suppressed by the observers perceptual apparatus The emblems become a source of tension to the obser Conclusion ver who feels compelled to focus attention on them, As socio-cultural phenomena. Communism and not unlike the hypnotised subject on the hypnotist and Nazism can be defined as non-transcendental messia his induction device. Carl Gustav Jung remarked of the nic millenarian movements holding out utopian visions tilted swastika in the Nazi flag that its apparent motion for their followers. The prophets of secular-chiliastic creates a «whirling circle of sinister connotation#, an Communism announced the coming of a terrestrial •appeal to the unconscious and its abysses#". paradise, the nClassless Society#; those of nativistic and The impact of the two symbols is further enhanced racist Nazism the rule of Aryan-Germanic supermen in by the «context effect# of the brightness contrast when a «Thousand Years Reich# The prediction of totalitarian the emblems - white disk with Swastika, yellow Hammer eschatology was that the «chosen people# - the prole and Sickle - are placed on the red background field of tariat, or the «Aryan» master race - would in a final the flag. Due to the relational nature of visual percep onslaught smash «The Enemy# - the «lmperialist tion, the perceived brightness of a stimulus figure is Bourgeoisie# and its lackeys, or international Jewry# determined not only by its own physical luminance but and its allies - whose evil conspiracies were revealed to also by that of the background stimulus. The colours the believers. Both totalitarian movements were capa used in both totalitarian flags are in the terminology of ble of controlling volition and behaviour of seemingly Pasch" lunmodified basic colours of high expressive ordinary and rational people and to motivate them into ness#, and the lightest colour shades perceived by committing extraordinary acts, on a scale never seen humans - white or yellow, respectively - were chosen before, in the pursuit of ideological goals that were bla to contrast with the red flag background. tantly irrational and considered absurd by many inde pendent thinkers. It is submitted here that this was achieved with flag 3.4 Neuro-psychological Utilisation of Symbols symbols to which an ideological meaning was arbitra in Totalitarian Propaganda rily assigned and which in their final configuration had The neuro-psychological utilisation of symbols in poli perceptual properties that made them psycho-physio- tical propaganda was first described in 1939 by Serge logically effective as conditioning stimuli when skilfully Tchakhotine", a student of Ivan R Pavlov. He pointed utilised by totalitarian propaganda. out Nazi methods of influencing the masses by condi tioning techniques. Tchakhotine explained the Nazi Acknowledgements achievement of total operational conformity of the na The author gratefully acknowledges the assistance of tion («Gleichschaltung#) by their effective application of Jin' Tenora, Whitney Smith and Bernward Hochkirchen Pavlovian conditioning in which Hitler's aggressive and in the historical documentation of the data, and the threatening phrases are in the hearer's mind associated help of Louise Jilek-Aall and Martica Jilek with the Nazi symbols which become their evocative signs. It is the specific effect on human perception cau sed by the particular configuration and context of the Notes
Nazi and the Communist flag that makes these two poli Gabriel Perreux, «Les origines du drapeau rouge en France#, Paris, tical symbols ideally suited for conditioning techniques. Presses universltaires, 1930. ' Valentin Karamanchev, *Proletarskaya Simvollka#, Moskva, Progress, A suggestive message is constantly repeated in slogans, 1978. shouted in chorus and chanted by crowds acting in uni = Adfolf Hitler. nMein Kampf», Munchen, Verlag Franz Eher Nachfolger, 1933, p 552 son, always surrounded by the same visual symbol. Nazi ' Arnold Rabbow, «dtv-Lexikon politischer Symbole A-Z>, Deutscher and Communist rhetoric, poetry and song lyrics docu Taschenbuch Verlag, Munchen, 1970, p.201, ' Arnold Whittick, «Symbols, Signs and their Meaning#, Newton, ment the quasi-sacred role assigned to the flag in the Mass,, Charles T. Branford PubI, I960, p 270. totalitarian movements which aim at achieving com ‘ Thomas Wilson,
120 Semiotic aspects and psychophyslological effects of totalitarian symbols: nazi and communist flags
Georg Franz-Wflling, *Ursprung der Hitlerbewegung 1919-1922», ’■ Wolfgang Koehler, «Gestaltpsychologie: An Introduction to New left above: Fig. 1 Preussisch-Oldendorf, K. W. Schutz Verlag, 1974. Concepts in Modern Psychology*. New York, Liveright Publishers, «Red Honour Flag of the Revolution*, Robert Payne, «The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler*, New York. 1947, Colour of the 212th Regiment, Samara Military Heritage Press / Dorset Press, 1989. Carl Gustav Jung, «Wotan», in. «Neue Schwe/zer Rundschau*, Ulyanowsk Redbanner Division, 1918, '■ Emile Durkheim, «The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life*, Jahrgang 3. 1935, pp.660-666. (From Gennadij N. Venevitimov, «Simvoly London, George Allen & Unwin, 1915, Georges Pasch, *Semiotic vexillology: the logical structure of flags*, bojevoy slavy*, Moskwa, Military Publishing Havelock Ellis, «The Psychology of Red*, in: «Popular Science in: «The Flag Bulletin*, no 100, vol. XXK, no. 3-4, May-August House, 1990) Monthly*, vol. 57, 1900, pp.365-375 and 51 7-526. 1983, pp.141-157. ’ Marshall Sahlins, «Colors and Cultures*, in: «Semiotica*, vol. 16, no. Serge Tchakhotine, «Le viol des foules par la propagande left below: Fig. 2 I. 1976, pp.1-22, politique*, Pans, Gallimard, 1952 (1st edition 1939). p.260. Proposed design of a state seal of the Brent Berlin & Paul Kay, «Basic Color Terms Their Universality and William Sargant. «Battle for the Mind. A Physiology of Conversion Russian Soviet Republic, June 1918. Evolution*, Berkeley, University of California Press, 1969. and Brainwashing*, London, Pan Books, 1959. right above: Fig. 3 Hitler's sketch of a Nazi storm trooper. 1920
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