Language and political reality: George Orwell reconsidered (original) (raw)
Related papers
A Pragmatic Study of the Abuse of Language in Orwell’s Novel: Nineteen Eighty-Four
Journal of Education College Wasit University, 2020
This research is concerned with analysing pragmatically the abuse of language upon people. The analysis focuses on the British novel, “Nineteen Eighty-Four” by George Orwell. This study aims at analysing the language used in the novel and showing how it can be used as an oppressive device that can be abused to lead to a totalitarian state. The model of analysis that is used in the current study is Grice’s theory of implicature and the cooperative principles (1975). The researcher employs qualitative method to have deep understanding and examination to the data of the present study. The results of this research reveal that pragmatic analysis shows that language can be used as a tool to spread power and authority. It can lead to a whole totalitarianism when those in power imply their aims and intuitions in the words they use. The implied meaning occurs when the speaker does not use the language directly and violates the relevance, the manner, the quality and the quantity maxims and be...
The Principles of Newspeak or How Language Defines Reality in Orwell S 1984
Journal of International Social Research, 2018
George Orwell in 1984 vividly depicts a totalitarian regime which draws upon multiple resources and an array of methods in order to control the minds of the individuals. In this paper, an argument is made that the true struggle between the collective and individual identity is underway in the domain of the totalizing discourse, and the discourse is a linguistic entity. It has been discussed how language is the only means by which the understanding of the world, both in its objective and subjective manifestations, is made possible and how the aspirations of the Oceania regime towards the control of the language, which is seen in its attempt to create Newspeak, is the key step towards the realization of a fully totalitarian ruling power. Then distinctive features of the Orwellian Newspeak are closely investigated to demonstrate how Newspeak functions by reducing the number of words in lexicon, hacking down the semantic horizons of the existing vocabulary and rigorously doing away with ambiguities and shades of meaning. It is argued that ambiguities and indeterminacy markers are the opportunities for the users of the language to practice their creative powers, and the Orwellian attempt to dispose of them in Newspeak is the final realization of totalitarianism that can be imaginable.
TURNING TO ORWELL TO UNDERSTAND ORWELL'S PROBLEM: A SOCIOLINGUISTIC VIEW
2006
Drawing on the works of groundbreaking linguists and sociolinguists of the likes of Noam Chomsky, Ferdinand de Saussure and Benjamin Lee Whorf, this paper traces the origins of Orwell's Problem by depicting the fictional sociolinguistic scenario presented in the classic Nineteen Eightyfour. A syntactic, morphological and semantic description of Orwell's fictitious language, 'Newspeak' (which is here addressed from a deterministic perspective), is followed by an analysis of the main social institutions found in the novel. Thereupon, Orwell's novel is depicted as a symbolic model for understanding how Orwell's Problem functions in real life.
A Literary Semiotics Approach to the Semantic Universe of George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four
A Literary Semiotics Approach to the Semantic Universe of George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four, 2018
The subject of semiotics is not to answer the questions such as what does the text says, who says the text, or what are the possible external— societal, individual, and historical—effects on the text. Instead, it is mainly interested in how signs are created, how they are articulated with each other to create the meaning in the text, and in what ways the meaning is created in different semantic layers within its system. The study necessitates focusing on the relations of the formative elements in the text which leads us to reach the narrative syntax that makes it possible to observe the underlying structures in different semantic strata of the text. Moreover, the approach helps us to analyze the meaning production process, as well as to observe the ways of the articulation process of meaningful items with each other to create the whole text. The main purpose of this study is to figure out the semantic organization of George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four narrative within the scope of Greimas's semiotic trajectory.
Language is the unique human talent that works amazingly in molding one's thoughts and deeds. If grown unrestricted, it can help people widen their notions about things and issues in and around them. On the other hand, if shrunk and chained, it hinders the flourishing of ideas and information. The blossoming as well as the limiting power of language has been very perspicuously illustrated by George Orwell in his dystopian novel, 1984. How linguistic constituents hold the absolute ability to do and undo human thoughts has been portrayed in the novel in the most striking manner. Orwell has shown how language can manipulate psychological functions supreme-handedly. To lead popular thought to a certain target, language has to be engineered in the required mechanism. It does so, and attains complete control over people's mind. This paper examines how language sets a demarcation line for human psychological processes. It attempts to dig deep into the linguistic treatment in 1984 and comes up with a vivid description of the dominance of language on people's mental procedure. It investigates the manipulations of the 'Newspeak' and strives to grasp a psycholinguistic analysis of the novel.
Language as an oppressive device in Orwell’s 1984 (by Bakhtiar Sabir Hama)
This paper is a critical study of “1984”, a novel by George Orwell. It specifically aims to study how language is used by the dominant authority in the fiction to oppress and to exert power over the population in the country. The analysis focuses on how the totalitarian system limits conversations and prevents freedom of speech through imposing on the characters to speak a language which is strange to them and very limited in terms of vocabulary. To achieve this objective, the study will focus on the sentences and paragraphs which show how language is used to frighten and oppress people. In certain cases, the dialogues which occur between the characters will be explored so as to clearly manifest the role of language in controlling the actions and the minds of the population. To manifest the relationship between language and power, the analysis is conducted within the framework of stylistics and critical discourse analysis. The researcher explores the linguistic features in some paragraphs and dialogues selected from the entire text so as to show how the government of Oceania controls the minds and actions of its inhabitants. Through such a framework of analysis, the thesis concludes that the totalitarian government manipulates language to dominate people, and language is not a social practice but it has political dimensions and regarded as a threat to the government if people can use it freely. Keywords: 1984, stylistics, critical discourse analysis, language, power
International Journal of Foreign Language Teaching and Research, 2021
World literature is replete with many texts that depict the imperialists using hypocritical language as an oppressive device for intimidating their subjects. The oppressors pretended to be the civilizers by inculcating the idea of "Benevolent Colonization" into the minds of the oppressed. In this paper, the researchers investigate how situational and linguistic contexts affect the meanings of utterances in George Orwell's selected novels. It is aimed to remove the gaps in the multicultural world by scrutinizing the power of language pragmatically. The methodology is qualitative based on Grice's theory of implicature. The novels under investigation both violate and adhere to the four maxims of Grice's theory of Conversational Implicature. The findings of the paper indicate that language can be used as a suppressive weapon for supporting imperialist objectives or hamper satisfactory human relations, and that positive gifts of imperialism come with the caveat that they are being achieved at the cost of exploiting the oppressed.
Language as an oppressive device in Orwell's 1984
Abstract This paper is a critical study of “1984”, a novel by George Orwell. It specifically aims to study how language is used by the dominant authority in the fiction to oppress and to exert power over the population in the country. The analysis focuses on how the totalitarian system limits conversations and prevents freedom of speech through imposing on the characters to speak a language which is strange to them and very limited in terms of vocabulary. To achieve this objective, the study will focus on the sentences and paragraphs which show how language is used to frighten and oppress people. In certain cases, the dialogues which occur between the characters will be explored so as to clearly manifest the role of language in controlling the actions and the minds of the population. To manifest the relationship between language and power, the analysis is conducted within the framework of stylistics and critical discourse analysis. The researcher explores the linguistic features in some paragraphs and dialogues selected from the entire text so as to show how the government of Oceania controls the minds and actions of its inhabitants. Through such a framework of analysis, the thesis concludes that the totalitarian government manipulates language to dominate people, and language is not a social practice but it has political dimensions and regarded as a threat to the government if people can use it freely. Keywords: 1984, stylistics, critical discourse analysis, language, power
A Linguistic Stylistic Study of George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four
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