– Politics and the English Language
domingo diciembre 12th 2010, 22:33
Filed under: Discurso Político

Last story I am talking about is the essay called Politics and the English Language. Orwell criticizes in this essay the contemporary English prose for its inaccurate use of language. The main consequence it has brought is that language has become a result of foolish thoughts and vagueness. There is a lack of imagery and the figurative language does not give any connection to images or thoughts.



It is an essay that presents a theory of the use of language which is supported by Orwell’s work and also by the historical use of language, with the aim of manipulating an audience. The author used languge as a tool to combat the spreading of totalitarian ideas around the world; to manipulate his readers agains Totalitarian governments.

After illustrating the decay of language at this time (40s) throughout the essay he offers as an antidote six elementary rules. They are:

1. Never use a metaphor, simile or other figure of speech that you are used to

seeing in print. He talks about not using cliches.

2. Never use a long word where a short one will do.

3. If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.

4. Never use the passive where you can use the active. You either know what means or you do not.

  1. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.

6. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous. That’s ironic in the way that Orwell has written this essay because he claims that people couch barbarous things such as war in political language.

So we have observed here how bad is the English Language, which drives also to the decay of the civilisation. This failure in the language has its cause in politics and economics.






     
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