BIG BROTHER BIGGEST BUREAUCRACY

Dear Orwell Today,

At the moment I'm studying '1984' with another novel (The Paper Eater) as part of my coursework. I have found a lot of what you have said useful. However I am still falling short on ideas about the language used, as there is so much. Newspeak is a concept specific to 1984, and so this is hard to compare. I wondered if you had any starting ideas that would help me, as I'm at a loss as to where to start analysing the language in 1984.

Thank You,
Rebecca

Greetings Rebecca,

You don't mention any examples of what you've read or found useful. But for starters you should read (or re-read) the 18.Newspeak theme and I'm sure some ideas will come to mind.

All the best,
Jackie Jura

PS - A synonym for "newspeak" is "bureaucracyspeak", and the biggest bureaucracy in the world (Big Brother) is the United Nations. Bureaucracies rely on acronyms (initials) for much of their communication, and these meaningless acronyms (except to members of each particular bureaucracy) are types of "newspeak" words. For example, see how many of the following UN (BB) acronyms you know the "oldspeak" (traditional English) words for: FAO, IFAD, ILO, ITC, ITU, OHCHR, UNAIDS, UNCDF, UNCTAD, UNDP, UNECA, UNEP, UNESCO, UNFPA, UNHCR, UNICEF, UNIDO, UNIFEM, WFP, WHO....

PPS - I hope that above little example gives you a kick-start in analysing the language of "1984"

Jackie Jura
~ an independent researcher monitoring local, national and international events ~

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