\
Josh Weckesser
AP Language and Composition
Three Topics Essay (A quality work)
Language is a vital part of everyone’s everyday life. Most information is
distributed and digested though the written and spoken word. History books rely entirely
on a formal set of rules for written language, the same with newspaper articles, journals,
novels, etc. When a man has a thought that he wishes to communicate quickly to a
fellow man he uses a set of rules for oral communication. Language is perhaps the
greatest tool of perceiving “reality” that humanity has.
George Orwell in 1984 illustrates an idea that the main character, Winston Smith,
calls the “alterability of the past.” In the novel the Ministry of Truth constantly seeks out
‘false’ information to replace with today’s ‘true’ information. Every article, history
book, etc is changed on a day to day basis to correspond with the demands of the current
time. It is done to protect the infallibility of The Party. It raises the question of what is
true. In the novel, Smith experiences a policy shift when The Party switches the war
effort from Eastasia to Eurasia. Within days of this every record in existence that had
ever mentioned a war with Eastasia was destroyed and changed to proclaim war efforts
against Euraisa. There was no possible way to prove that a war with Eastasia had ever
occurred.
Granted this is an extreme case to relate to the modern-day world, however there
are theories that such an event could occur. The example that smacks one in the face like
a dead fish would be that of Wag the Dog, a recent movie in which the plot revolves
around presidential asides ‘inventing’ a war. Another great illustration would be if two
people entered into a fistfight (A and B). A looses the fight. However, before B can tell
anyone he dies from an act of God. The next day A tells everyone that he won the fight.
Twenty years down the line A dies. How can one prove that A lost the fight? In theory it
cannot be proven. What actually happened is misrepresented, the past is changed, or
altered.
This same question has been raised about current translations of the Bible. It is a
great theological debate between loose and strict interpretation of the Bible. The
propionates of loose interpretation claim that one could not consider the Bible to be
completely true. The Bible was originally written in Hebrew and then translated into
1
\
Latin and finally into the Modern English dialect of the NIV Bible. How could
something so translated from such ancient scripts be literally correct? The ideas and
morals presented are correct yet the stories my not be accurate.
Another idea presented by Orwell in “Politics and the English Language” is that
of the degeneration of language. He claims that language evolves yet that does not mean
in changing it as to loose the sharpness of excellent communication and that if such
trends are noticed they are reversible. This is almost echoed in Lutz’s “Doublespeak”
article. In it Lutz claims that certain uses language can be used to mask communication,
a direct opposite result then what language is intended.
Mastergate: A Play on Words by Larry Gelbart is a satire on the complete lack of
intent to communicate in the government. Mastergate was written in the late 80’s, a few
decades after Orwell’s “Politics and the English Language,” giving Orwell the timeless
success of a prophet. A character in Mastergate by the name of Shepherd Hunter has the
line, “And can you tell us, prior to that occurrence, what your title was, sir, during the
series of past events, the accumulative effect of which lead up to the present time?” This
could easily be reduced to simple terms to prevent repetition and make the question easily
understandable.
This is obvious in today’s world most painfully when looking at great authors,
such as Milton or Shakespeare. “Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?” is a
famous line from Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, however it is still a struggle for
students today to understand. Shakespeare wrote in English, the same language spoken
today, and is well respected for being an excellent user of the language, then it could be
assumed that as that majority of people don’t understand it today that the language has
degraded.
Going right along with this degeneration of language would be Orwell’s idea
about restriction of thought. Returning again to 1984 Orwell uses New Speak to illustrate
this. The most profound example would be that of good. New Speak would remove the
word bad and replace it with ungood. Also, excellent, disgustingly beautiful, horrendous,
and words similar to those would be replaced by qualifying the word “good.” (for
example; double minus ungood)
2
\
The word most restrictive to thought today would be that of the colloquial ‘cool.’
A brief example.
“Hey man, what are you doing tonight?”
“Nothing much.”
“Cool.”
The cool used above could mean anything. It is completely ambiguous. The
speaker could be trying to say it’s cool that you’re busy tonight. It’s cool that I don’t
have to do anything with you. It’s cool that I feel bad about you not doing something
with me. However, the most common thought would be that the speaker has no idea
what feelings they were trying to convey and just said ‘cool’ because it was an
appropriate response.
As more and more of these slang words with ambiguous definitions and meanings
appear then the less and less people have to think. Soon it will become possible to not
think and all and have a five-minute conversation about nothing.
“Hey.”
“Yo.”
“You cool?”
“Yeah, man. I’m cool.”
“Whatcha doing?’
“Just chillin’.”
“Chillin’ huh?”
“Yeah.”
“Cool.”
And so on.
Reality is defined by the input people receive from the world around them. The
weather conditions in Africa is taken from pictures and text that are sent to the United
States from Africa. The thoughts people have about the President comes more from NBC
Nightly News and The Chicago Tribune then from actually listening to what he has to
say. When one is aware of the “alterability of the past,” the degeneration of language and
restrictions of thoughts one becomes better equipped to qualify the world around them.
3