Riddle The English Language By George Orwell

“Newspeak was designed to. . .diminish the range of thought. . .by cutting the choice of words down to a minimum” explains George Orwell, the author of a dystopian fiction novel, 1984 (Orwell 300). Orwell designs a society in which a totalitarian government rules, depriving people of their thoughts. The story gives us a look into the life of the main character, Winston, who seems to face issues with reality control. Today, we will delve into the depths of this novel and explore Orwell’s views on the nature of language. In simple terms, Orwell suggests that language, if used in a certain way, has the ability to influence people and compel them to alter their thoughts. With this statement and supporting evidence, it can be concluded that the effective use of language can give individuals power to modify or reshape opinions that will allow for change in society.

George Orwell’s essay, Politics and the English Language, first published in 1946, talks about some “bad habits”, which have driven the English language in the wrong direction, that is, away from communicating ideas. In his essay he quotes five passages, each from a different author, which embody the faults he is talking about. He lists dying metaphors, operators, pretentious diction, and meaningless words as things to look out for in your own writing and the writing of others (593-595). He talks about political uses of the English language. Our language has become ugly and the ugliness impedes upon communication. Ugly uses of language have been reinforced and passed down in the population “even among people who should and do know

Orwell begins his essay claiming that the “English language is in a bad way” which he continuously gives examples of throughout the rest of the essay. From the start, it is clear that Orwell believes that the English language is on a continuous downward spiral that is not caused by one person, but by the collection of everyone. Language has become ugly and inaccurate, which engages no imagery and makes the people look foolish, making the idea worthless. People have stopped trying to make their statements precise and as clear to the audience as possible, which is spreading to the next generations. They also are more concerned with how the sentence looks with big vocabulary, often using those words or phrases incorrectly, than about the big

1.Throughout the essay, Orwell talks about many of the problems in English language and how they all contribute to its downfall. One reason for its decline is the use of dying metaphors. A dying metaphor is one that has no impact on the reader, it has no meaning, and doesn’t enhance the readers experience. Another reason is the use of verbal false limbs and pretentious diction, which are used to make single words or short phrases into unnecessarily long and complex phrases in an attempt to sound smarter or more sophisticated. They also use words that are from Greek and Latin language. By bringing in another language into our own, we begin to break away from our origin of the English language. Next, meaningless words are also a problem

Throughout the story, you see the way that the pig, Squealer, gives information to the “lowly” animals. He tells them what the leading pig, Napoleon, wants them to know, but he tells it in a way that it seems they are benefitting. Squealer had a way of persuading the other animals to listen to him, through his actions and manipulation. “The best known among them was a small, fat pig named Squealer, with very round cheeks, twinkling eyes, nimble movements and a shrill voice. He was a brilliant talker, and when he was arguing some difficult point he had a way of skipping from side to side and whisking his tail, which was somehow very persuasive. The others said of Squealer that he could turn black to white.”

Language is very powerful and can be used in a good, uplifting way or a negative, controlling way. Language is more powerful when used to uplift and inspire. In George Orwell’s book Animal Farm, the animals take over to try to make a better society and life for themselves where the pig rule. One of the leaders of the farm, Napoleon, drives out the other leader, Snowball because he was greedy and power corrupt. Eventually after years of running the farm the pigs turn into how the humans were. They drank, took all the food and never worked. Martin Luther King JR's ‘I have a Dream’ speech and John F. Kennedy’s inaugural speech are more examples of how language can uplift. In the book, Animal Farm, there are many examples about how language

Political press can play such crucial role in the viewpoints of citizens; with an impact like this, it is essential to have explicit information. George Orwell’s 1946 essay “Politics and the English Language” he argues that Politicians have manipulated the English language, thus making their points euphemistic. He explains that these that, “...it is broadly true that political writing is bad writing” and results to a politician being “unconscious of what he is saying” (Orwell). Even though this essay was written in 1946, Orwell’s six basic rules are still broken. For instance, Donald Trump’s immigration speech is prime example of what Orwell would conclude as “nonsense”. The speech breaks the elementary rules by using unfamiliar phrases,

George Orwell, in an essay from Shooting an Elephant and Other Essays titled “Politics and the English Language” (1950), argues that the English language, through a cyclical process of sloven language and foolish thought, has become “ugly and inaccurate.” He supports his argument by using expert opinion, metaphors, and historical context. Orwell’s purpose is to demonstrate the debasement of the English language in order to prompt writers to make a conscious change in their writing . He adopts an informal tone (“Look back throughout this essay, and for certain you will find that I have again and again committed the very faults I am protesting against”) for writers in a time of political turnover and rising superpowers.

Politics in today's day and age is slippery and redundant. Terms like "fake news" and "alternative facts" have been used to describe the manipulation of language. George Orwell's essay "Politics and the English Language" analyzes many examples of literature and explains why they are bad, why they are influential, and how easily language can be manipulated. Plato's "Allegory of the Cave" touches on the interaction between the ignorant and the wise. Referring to Orwell and Plato's writings, this essay will analyze the current political state. Language is being used in a negative connotation which is frequently occurring in today's politics.

Orwell describes verbal false limbs and pretentious diction as extra wording in an idea to make it sound nicer to the ear or sound more intelligent. A verbal false limb is the misuse of verbs and nouns to give a sentence more syllables, while pretentious diction is where foreign expressions or higher level words are chosen to enhance the sentence. These both negatively affect language and meaning because they do not make any idea more clear to the reader, they are only used to make them sound smarter, therefore even confusing some readers. Students definitely use these tactics in order to make the teacher think that they know what they are talking about when really they have no clue what is going on. If they sound smart, than the teacher

In George Orwell's 1984 language is used to manipulate thought and action. Language is an important part of societies in that it aids in the way people think. Limitation and restriction of language hinders now people think. The more words someone knows, the better they can articulate how they feel. In 1984, The Party uses "newspeak" and thoughtcrime as a way to control the citizens of the community.

In 1984 by George Orwell, language is an important function of control. If control was taken seriously within a state than outbursts of war and defiance would be omitted. The Party controls everything, for example, historical records, language, and what people think. The Party manipulates information and forbids the members to keep and records of their lives. By doing so, they manipulate the past experiences of the members in order to control the present.

In George Orwell’s essay “Politics and the English Language” he criticises the modern prose and addresses where the problems come from. His main point is that written works often have a staleness of imagery and lack of precision. By this he means the writer uses cliche and repeated phrases in their works, and they use words that will take away from the meaning more than it would add to it. Orwell discusses that most of these problems arise from imitation and the use of meaningless words. He feels that people will read something and find a word or phrase they like and repeat that in there work, which makes it stale. Using words just because they sound better and will fill out more space does not always mean they will fit the sentence

Thoughtcrime! To Parsons dismay it had happened to him, and if it weren’t for his precious children he may never have been caught. His blubbering words of horror would make one think he had actually committed a crime. Yet, had he? By the third part of the book, Big Brother’s grasp had tightened, and there was no getting out of it. The control he had over Oceania ran so deep, the population would commit to crimes they didn’t even know they had done. This virtual character had created so many facets of terror to keep the population in line, and as far as we knew it was working. The inner party happily did Big Brothers dirty work, and continued to work on dumbing down the society through Newspeak, and using a media presence to erase the past and use convicted people of thoughtcrime as a big “what not to

Most people who bother with the matter at all would admit that the English language is in a bad way, but it is generally assumed that we cannot by conscious action do anything about it. Our civilization is decadent and our language -- so the argument runs -- must inevitably share in the general collapse. It follows that any struggle against the abuse of language is a sentimental archaism, like preferring candles to electric light or hansom cabs to aeroplanes. Underneath this lies the half-conscious belief that language is a natural growth and not an instrument which we shape for our own purposes.