Newspeak is the weird official language of English Socialism (Ingsoc) in George Orwell’s 1984. Its purpsose is “not only to provide a medium of expression for the world-view and mental habits proper to the devotees of Ingsoc, but to make all other modes of thought impossible.” It has three categories: A, B, and C vocabulary. A vocabulary are words used in everyday life, but stripped down and then recombined (knife, speedful, doublepluscold, undark). B vocabulary are words constructed for political purposes (goodsex, thinkpol, duckspeaker). C vocabulary are obscure technical terms without reference to any scientific thinking.

I think the New Newspeak, as we have today, is conceived so as not to diminish the range of thoughts, but to extend and obscure them. I am quite amused by these trendy words: copyleft, geek, hentai, organic, terrorist, hot, design… above all, I think the word “free” has presently acquired a bizarre Orwellian taste. Free as in free speech, free beer, or free range chicken?

Posted on May 17th, 2006  | RSS 2.0 |