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What "Orwellian" really means – Noah Tavlin (5:31), TED-Ed [1] |
Orwellian is an adjective describing a situation, idea, or societal condition that George Orwell identified as being destructive to the welfare of a free and open society. It denotes an attitude and a brutal policy of draconian control by propaganda, surveillance, disinformation, denial of truth ( doublethink), and manipulation of the past, including the " unperson"—a person whose past existence is expunged from the public record and memory, practised by modern repressive governments. Often, this includes the circumstances depicted in his novels, particularly Nineteen Eighty-Four, [2] despite the narrative depicting a society in which only governmental employees are under repressive scrutiny, but political doublespeak is criticized throughout his work, such as in Politics and the English Language. [3]
The New York Times has said the term is "the most widely used adjective derived from the name of a modern writer". [4] [5]
External videos | |
---|---|
What "Orwellian" really means – Noah Tavlin (5:31), TED-Ed [1] |
Orwellian is an adjective describing a situation, idea, or societal condition that George Orwell identified as being destructive to the welfare of a free and open society. It denotes an attitude and a brutal policy of draconian control by propaganda, surveillance, disinformation, denial of truth ( doublethink), and manipulation of the past, including the " unperson"—a person whose past existence is expunged from the public record and memory, practised by modern repressive governments. Often, this includes the circumstances depicted in his novels, particularly Nineteen Eighty-Four, [2] despite the narrative depicting a society in which only governmental employees are under repressive scrutiny, but political doublespeak is criticized throughout his work, such as in Politics and the English Language. [3]
The New York Times has said the term is "the most widely used adjective derived from the name of a modern writer". [4] [5]