Sarah I.

Cabbuag

Mr. Erwin L. Oamil

III 2 BEE

S-ENG 22

The Mutualism between Politics and English Language

An analysis of George Orwells Politics and the English Language

George Orwells Politics and the English Language is an essay about the relationship
between politics and the English language. Orwell was notably sensitive to political
manipulation in his period, thus becomes one of the first to ponder the status of the English
language in those years. In the introduction of his essay, there is a clear statement that the
modern English is filled with bad habits, and people at that time are using the language
imprecisely; especially in politics public speeches, manifestos, leading articles, and many
more. To exhibit his observations of those bad habits, Orwell cited five passages which share the
following commonalities: (1) hackneyed selection of words (politics affecting the language); and
(2) vagueness of thoughts (language affecting politics).

Hackneyed selection of words

George Orwells first argument regards to the staleness of imagery. Usually, people use
metaphors to stimulate ones mind; however if one uses worn-out metaphors and continues to use
it for the sake of saving time in finding the right term and meaning, then it loses its vividness
(e.g. Achilles heel for the word weakness). There are even cases that one uses metaphors without
even knowing how it works and including incompatible metaphors, which is said to be a sign
that the writer is not anymore interested in his/her work.

He also noted about adding fillers in such language: either they use complex words over
simple words (make contact with instead of to contact); or passive voice over active voice (to
make the sentence longer and complicated); or noun construction over gerunds (by examination
of rather than by examining). Additionally, they substitute simple conjunctions and prepositions
with longer phrases (such as with respect to, having regard to, etc.).
Briefly, Orwell points out that the contemporary political prose (spoken and written
language) overrates the usage of complexity in words. The more highfalutin and composite the
phrases used, the better and more educated you are. Politics greatly affects the modern English
language in a sense that people in Orwells time prefer using a language that is overloaded with
meaningless jargon and pretentious phrases and words to sound euphonious and convincing to
the community.

Vagueness of thoughts
On his second argument, George Orwell discerns a debasement of the modern English
language by expressing lack of precision. He states that the English language becomes ugly and
inaccurate because our thoughts are foolish, but the slovenliness of our language makes it easier
for us to have foolish thoughts.
Another thing is that, if a person is so used of delivering a language consisting of
gumming together long strips of words, then he or she may arrive to a kind of thinking wherein
mental image do not anymore form in his or her mind, which leads to making nonsense out of his
or her words; or as Orwell describes it making the results presentable by sheer humbug. If you
are to repeat your words over and over, there may be a tendency of losing its meaning
particularly to yourself, thus results in having indefinite thoughts. Moreover, modern English

affects politics in their delivery of speeches and written works, which is why there should be
concreteness in ones thoughts and language for these two works hand in hand.

In conclusion, George Orwell indicates the importance of the relationship between

language and thought, if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought. If
you are aware of what is happening around us, you can see that Orwells points seem to be
present in todays century. If one gets rid of these habits one can think more clearly, and to
think clearly is a necessary first step toward political regeneration: so that the fight against bad
English is not frivolous and is not the exclusive concern of professional writers. The moral is to
become attentive and critical so that we attain clarity and control over our thoughts and language.

Reference:
Orwell, G. (1946). Politics and the English Language. London: Horizon. Retrieved from
http://www.orwell.ru/library/essays/politics/english/e_polit/
Tighe, C. (n.d.). Orwells Politics and the English Language. Retrieved from
www.carltighe.co.uk/pdffiles/43%20Orwell's%20Politics%20and%20the%20English
%20Language.pdf