Dissemination

Definition:

            The way and degree to which the message a movement is trying to send is spread to the public. Without any dissemination, protest movements are not visible and will have much less impact than movements that are visible and widely disseminated through a wide variety of sources. Things such as violence, visuals, drama, and conflict all serve to increase dissemination of a protest and therefore its visibility.

Example from the text or protest movement:

DeLuca and Peeples use the Greenpeace, an environmental protection organization, as an example of effective dissemination and its consequences. Early Greenpeace directors understood the concept of using spectacle as a means to use the media to bring issues into the public consciousness, and despite a lack of organization, resources, and large membership, they were astonishingly successful in their goals (DeLuca and Peeples, 192).

Passages from the text that help define or contextualize the term:

            “This understanding of mass media has translated into a practice of staging image events for dissemination… mass media provide a delivery system for image events that explode ‘in the public’s consciousness to transform the way people view their world’” (DeLuca and Peeples, 192).

            “‘The more dramatic you can make it, the more controversial it is, the more publicity you will get… The drama translates into exposure. Then you tie the message into that exposure and fire it into the brains of millions of people in the process’ (quoted in Scarce, 1990, p.104)” (DeLuca and Peeples, 192).

Source:

DeLuca, Kevin M. and Peeples, Jennifer. "From Public Sphere to Public Screen: Democracy, Activism, and the 'Violence' of Seattle." Readings in the Rhetoric of Social Protest. Browne, Stephen Howard, and Charles E. Morris III, eds. State College, PA: Strata Publishing, Inc., 2013.