I think about this quote from 1984 literally every day:
“Don’t you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought? In the end we shall make thoughtcrime literally impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it. Every concept that can ever be needed will be expressed by exactly one word, with its meaning rigidly defined and all its subsidiary meanings rubbed out and forgotten.” (1.5.23, Syme)
And more:
“It’s a beautiful thing, the Destruction of words. Of course the great wastage is in the verbs and adjectives, but there are hundreds of nouns that can be got rid of as well. It isn’t only the synonyms; there are also the antonyms. After all, what justification is there for a word, which is simply the opposite of some other word? A word contains its opposite in itself. Take ‘good,’ for instance. If you have a word like ‘good,’ what need is there for a word like ‘bad’? ‘Ungood’ will do just as well – better, because it’s an exact opposite, which the other is not. Or again, if you want a stronger version of ‘good,’ what sense is there in having a whole string of vague useless words like ‘excellent’ and ‘splendid’ and all the rest of them? ‘Plusgood’ covers the meaning or ‘doubleplusgood’ if you want something stronger still. Of course we use those forms already, but in the final version of Newspeak there’ll be nothing else. In the end the whole notion of goodness and badness will be covered by only six words – in reality, only one word. Don’t you see the beauty of that, Winston? It was B.B.’s idea originally, of course,” he added as an afterthought. (1.5.23, Syme)
1984 is a great book. But do you remember how it ended?
Sure do. I always figure that if I refuse to go along with the lies, something important in me is still alive.
Razib, have you read the preface Orwell wrote to Animal Farm? It’s a political essay that the publishers probably wisely refused to include. It actually makes me feel better about today’s situation. Things were worse then and the hold of the lies seemed stronger.
He called it The Freedom of the Press but it’s about much more.
Speaking as someone who was born in the Soviet Union — yes , today’s climate is scary…
Orwell was brilliant, considering he had never lived in the USSR.
Also recommend the “The Road to Wigan Pier”. The first part for historic significance and the second for the political.
That language can limit a person’s range of thought is not an idea accepted by linguists. It may influence thought, however.
https://linguistlist.org/ask-ling/sapir.cfm
@Erika – we need a ‘like’ button. Intuitively, what you have said seems right to me.
john, i added something for that.
Thanks Razib.
I found out the other day that in Bangkok, reading 1984 in public was a form of silent protest against the military junta that got offenders arrested back in 2014. https://www.scmp.com/news/asia/article/1538616/protesting-thai-reader-orwells-1984-dragged-police-bangkok
Mr. Khan, did you ever comment on this? https://news.brown.edu/articles/2018/08/gender
i did on twitter. the short of it is that this shows how easy it is to push the academy and shape social science. this should open the flood-gates for motivated activist groups of all sorts.
#BURNITDOWN!