This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 |
I am amazed that examples spreading racist terminology were not only left up for a year, but that when they were finally changed to terms that did not target any group by identity, but rather a point of view by choice, someone actually changed the page back! TWICE! Is it really that important to maintain a racist presentation of a political topic? -- surfergirl
The following paragraph (removed from the main article) needs NPOVing:
Another example is the attempt to rewrite the definition of the word " anti-Semitism". This word was coined in the late 1800s by a German author to refer specifically to the hatred of Jewish people; this terminology was intended to suggest that the hatred of Jews had a scientific basis. Since then this word has always meant hatred of Jews, and Jewish people alone. But in recent years anti-Semites themselves have begun to claim that this word actually means "hatred towards those who speak Semitic languages", which includes Arabs. Therefore, in this Newspeak, by definition no Arab can possibly be an anti-Semite. Against this pro-Israeli history writing rests the fact that Palestinians used this argument already in the early 20th century, when the word itself was new. Hence, the position of the pro-Israel camp is fundamentally flawed.
Given the controvery over the term "anti-Semitism" (especially as it has been used by non-semites to mean anti-arab which makes the arguement fall apart) maybe we should switch to a less controversial example. Possibly the word fundamentalism ? -- Imran 00:17 Nov 28, 2002 (UTC)
Jack Lynch,
I accept the change you made to "politically correct language, on the other hand, is said to have the goal of freeing individuals," etc. That seems fair enough to me. However, by the same standard, I see nothing wrong with the word "arguably" in the sentence, "Either way, there is arguably a resemblance between political correctness and Newspeak", etc; I have, therefore, put it back. R Lowry 20:10, 12 Dec 2003 (UTC)
The last few paragraphs should be moved to an article on Political correctness in general. I agree that "differently abled" is annoying, but that is a POV. (stand-up comedians have had a field day on it -- "dead" is now "differently alive", etc) It's wrong to state that "different" implies "different but equal". "differently able" can mean "less able": the point is that is doesn't automatically mean that. -- Tarquin
I have difficulty understanding the relevance of the following passsage of text:
In what sense is 'murder' an offensive term? And is 'collateral damage' really an example of politically correct terminology? An earlier version of this article contained the following text, which I think is far more informative:
This text was denounced as 'racist' and removed (see top of this Talk page) a little while ago, and eventually replaced with the 'collateral damage' example. I can understand why people might be hesitant to include an example containing racist terminology; surely, though, it is precisely the purpose of the example to demonstrate the contrast between a genuinely offensive term and its p.c. alternative. And, surely, in order to do that, the offensive term has to be included. R Lowry 22:25, 27 Jan 2004 (UTC)
"== Real-Life Examples of Newspeak ==
A comparison to Newspeak can be seen in political rhetoric, where two opposing sides string together phrases so empty of meaning that they may be compared to the taunts young children toss back and forth. The arguments of either side ultimately reduce to "I'm good; he's bad."
Charges of Newspeak are sometimes advanced when a group tries to replace a word/phrase that is politically incorrect (e.g. "civilian casualties") or offensive (e.g. "murder") with a politically correct or inoffensive one (e.g. " collateral damage"). Some maintain, in opposition to this practice, that to make certain words or phrases 'unspeakable' is tantamount to restricting what ideas may be held ( thoughtcrime). Others believe that expunging terms that have fallen out of favour or become insulting will make people less likely to hold outdated or offensive views.
Either way, there is arguably a resemblance between political correctness and Newspeak, although some will feel that they differ in their intentions: in Nineteen Eighty-Four, Newspeak is instituted to enhance the power of the state over the individual; politically correct language, on the other hand, is said to have the goal of freeing individuals from limitations imposed by preconceptions due to the use of certain terms. It is this attempt to change thought through changing (or eliminating) words that earns political correctness the perceived connection to Newspeak."
This IMO, is a mess. NPOV does not mean doubting every possible step along the way. Either Lowry and I need to come to some far better agreement, or preferably some others should become involved. JackLynch 02:09, 13 Dec 2003 (UTC)
I am leaving this version here, and putting my version in the article. Don't take it the wrong way, it is of course open to further edits, but I want my suggestion to have its chance. JackLynch 02:22, 13 Dec 2003 (UTC)
If, in China, unauthorized publishing of dictionaries is prohibited, there is, or should, be people who make their own dictionaries and distribute them electronically or something. Or non-Chinese should make a Chinese dictionary. Can we get some examples of just HOW Chinese words have been redefined? -- Zoe
It's also a little hard to distribute electronic dictionaries when you have the "Great Firewall of China" to deal with.~~Paul
E-prime has been viewed by some as a "simplified, Newspeak-like English"; I disagree with this and I've found it useful. I also find it more difficult to use than regular english. Use it as a tool, experiment with it; don't view it as law or as something enforced by a tyrannical government. I don't considerit a form of newspeak at all. -- unsigned
This article links to sexcrime which doesn't exist, but crimesex does. Which is correct? Graue 11:07, 20 May 2005 (UTC)
I don't think it's appropriate to label every new form of jargon, sociolect or dialect as newspeak. Isn't the term usually applied to forms of jargon and neologism that have some sort of political motivation, and come with some sort of taboo on not using them?
I removed the section on SMS "TXT SPK" as the connection to Newspeak is tenuous at best. If someone wishes this section to be included in the article please include some kind of explaination. 213.168.230.149 20:33, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
Most of the newspeak "word" articles consist of a paragraph or at two of rather redundant text and links to other newspeak word-articles. Most of these cannot properly be expanded, since they are hardly used outside of 1984 and are basically definitions. These should be merged in. Doublethink (and thoughtcrime) merits its own article since it has, ironically, entered the standard English vocabulary and is an important concept known beyond its literary context. The Ingsoc article is also substantial enough that it can probably stand on its own. Possibly prolefeed and unperson as well, if they are improved. The rest should be merged and redirected. I have already redirected the doubleplusungood article since that was the prior consensus and the redirect was replaced by a terrible writeup. NTK 20:20, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
Right folks, what's the big idea of having Newspeak language redirect to Newspeak, which in turn redirects to Oldspeak (Standard English), its total opposite, which in turn is actually an article about Newspeak (check the first bold word)? Fix it! 82.139.85.118 14:07, 6 May 2006 (UTC)
Looking through the past versions of Newspeak gives me the impression that the article hasn't evolved but rather deteriorated since the original entry. If anybody cares to keep the "Real-life examples" then serious thought should be given to exploit this in a separate article. Another option would be to create a new separate article just for Orwell's Newspeak. -- mic
I don't disagree that a resemblance between PC and Newspeak can be coherently argued; what I disliked was the blunt statement, "there is a resemblance", as though this were something that had been definitively proved. It can be argued equally coherently that the differences between PC and Newspeak are significant enough to make them, really, two different things. It's important to include both viewpoints in Wikipedia, without being seen to favour one or the other.
On a similar note: I think that your new sentence, "Of course it is this very attempt to change thought thru changing (or eliminating) words that earns political correctness the connection to Newspeak," is fine, but it could really do with the qualifying term "perceived" before the word "connection". Just my opinion. R Lowry 20:30, 12 Dec 2003 (UTC)
Query Newspeak link in Newspeak article. Malquote? Doubleplusungood ifso. --[Not signed, no date stamp]
"[A]im was to make subversive thought" -> "aim was to make all alternative thought". Cf.
duckspeak, Pynchon, and Fromm.
"The purpose of Newspeak was 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".[
Principles of Newspeak ] "The basic idea behind Newspeak was to remove all shades of meaning from language". [
Newspeak, from an afterword by
Erich Fromm in 2003 U.S. edition. (Content of the foreword by
Thomas Pynchon as well as the afterword is frequently plagiarized, as an engine search for key phrases demonstrates.) ]
"Newspeak words", whether merge into the main article: yes, more intuitive also. Could still hyperlink.
"See also", + link to article on source since Newspeak discussed there also.
Bug: ref="multiple, 2003 ed." command or ref="2003" command per
Multiple uses DNF. Kludge: "ref" command used instead, generates duplicate in "Notes and References" section.
References manually generated as a backup. Format per
MoS.
Pynchon and Fromm referenced are frequently plagiarized elsewhere on the Web. {{
Citation needed}} in article at relevant text.
Link
Totalitarian Language: Orwell's Newspeak and Its Nazi and Communist Antecedents not found so moved here until created.
"External Links" -> "Further Reading", per MoS
Further reading/external links.
"Retrieved [date]", since on-line reference links break (per
Embedded links)
Original wording retained as could. Might be shortened.
-- GoDot 01:28, 8 May 2006 (UTC)
"Politically correct" can be seen as a phrase in conservative newspeak meant to allude to orwellian nightmares. To me, labelling a group of people as "niggers" also appears as politically charged.
I argue that no neutral language seems to exist; all languages looks shaped by (and if sapir-whorf is correct, shapes) their culture and the intentions of their speakers. Sometimes intentionally ("collateral damage", "politically correct", "womyn") and sometimes unintentionally ("nigger").
I consider "charging the opposite view with allegations of newspeak" as a form of newspeak itself.
Davin Bacon 00:16, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
The term "Politically Correct" is far too loaded, in my mind, to be used extensively in that secion. Instead of "Politically Correct Euphamisms," I propose changing it to something like "Political Euphamisms," and mentioning "political correctness" as just one example some cite of such euphamisms. For one thing, the term itself is generally used to charicature liberals; "collateral damage" is not an example of the term PC as is most commonly used. It bears mentioning, but not to such an extent. MRig 04:50, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
Finishing reading the article, I was reminded of l33t-speek, but really more so just "teen-speak". Try to talk to someone which is really "into" that, and you get nothing out from them, just "brb lol afk back thx asl", but then, did teens ever speak about big things (I know this can sound condescenting, but...)?
But then we have the adult version: just talking about the weather, and one of my favorite (anon) quotes:
"my biggest fear is that one day we will meet eachother on the street and have an artificial conversation".
One could say "artificial" is PC/new-speak because you say what you think is "right", what will not offend anyone, and also it will always spark discussion. You think, you have to say something to this person, when you meet them, you have to say something nice, something light. In this way, emotions are removed from language, from communicating, and if you never talk strongly about things "oooh (celebrity) is so sexy on (tv show) and did you see his fight with (other celebrity)" you could never try to change the world. Well, except to give yourself more money/power...
But then also in relation which might not seem logically so:
"We are so vain that we care for the opinion of those we don't care for"
- Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach (Adjust your speech, your character, your everything, to "how you think" you're supposed to act. Ok. Nevermind)
--
Seas 21:39, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Thats an excellent point, I don't suppose you've read Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451? ~~Paul
I don't understand how l33t can be considered a form of Newspeak. I can't see any significant similarity in the way l33t and Newspeak "substitute words and phrases" as the article says. Could someone please give examples of some l33t words/phrases which are Newspeak-like, and explain to me why the relationship between l33t and Newspeak is significant? -- Jibjibjib 07:24, 2 February 2006 (UTC)
Should spelling checkers be added in here as an example of it in real life? eg I used to spell really well, but now I have MS word my grasp of spelling has deteriorated. I find the same with grammer. Auto correct does the same. i am now almost unable to spell entreprenuer, always getting the e & u around the wrong way. I dont think its unreasonable that people in the near future will be dependent on machines to use their own languages correctly 222.155.79.66 04:36, 1 April 2007 (UTC)
This section seems unnecessary, about half the paragraph explains that the book doesn't contain Newspeak, the other half is tortured reasoning about why some of it could be interpreted to have the same effect as Newspeak.
And then, of course, there is the whole missing spoilers warning, if I understadn wikiprotocol correctly.
And the abbreviations used in the Kornbluth story are very directly based on those actually used in telegraphic communication at the time, due to the policy of charging on a per-word basis. Kornbluth in fact worked as a wire-service rewrite man, and was celarly imitatign the dispatches he saw on a daily basis. DES (talk) 23:08, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
This is so obviously irrelevant for the reasons above that I've removed it. It seems to have been added by Adam Keller but he doesn't interact on his talk page (or here it seems) so I haven't told him. 88.111.85.129 05:38, 9 June 2007 (UTC)
the two paragraphs about the failings of newspeak really have no place here without an outside citation. they read exactly as if someone decided to stick a condensed version of a term paper into the article. the criticism is fine, though there are several comments above which present a good case for it being incorrect, but it needs to have a traceable origin. i move to remove these sections altogether and put out a request for newspeak criticism. 209.169.48.66 23:30, 1 May 2007 (UTC)
The real life pitfall of the Newspeak is, of course, that there are real-life agglutinative languages which act exactly as Orwell suggests, and the various suffixes, prefixes and derivatives allow almost endless possibilities for neologizising. Instead of shackling the thought, Newspeak actually just enhances the possibilities of expression of its speakers. Certain languages, such as Finnish, Japanese or Hungarian, work almost perfectly on the Newspeak principles — they have very sparse basic vocabularies, but almost all the expressions are derived from the stem words by various prefixes and suffixes.
But again the real-life pitfall of the agglutinative languages looms here: agglutinative languages, like Finnish language, offer almost endless possibilities to neologize an expression or a word by using just basic vocabulary and the various prefixes and suffixes. A concept which is not assumed to exist is easy to conceive by using a word root and derivative prefixes or suffixes. The concept of "freedom" (Finnish vapaus) would be easy to conceive by using expression omaehtoepäestoisuus ("own-condition-un-hinder-ity") where the only word roots needed would be "ehto" (condition) and "esto" (hinder), and the word still would be perfectly understandable Finnish, albeit clumsy. In Newspeak this would be avoided by removing, for example, the word own (and possible hinder) from the language, since in a world where no personal possession or even private thought is possible, there would be no need for a word like own. Similarly, Oldspeak words may be stripped of certain meanings while retaining others, such that though it would be possible to say the weather is good, the phrase the Party is ungood would be meaningless. Even so, it is unlikely that such complete control would be technically possible; even if the expression "the Party is ungood" does not normally make sense, groups of rebels could slightly alter their language to make it make sense. Even if the word "own" is removed, then a word could be formulated that meant "condition-of-person-not-hindered-by-other-people". "Uprising" could be represented by "people-making-attack-on-Party". To fully remove this possibility would be impossible; as long as the words "Party", "people" and "attack" exist, they could be made to say "People-attack-party". To remove thoughtcrime, practically all words would have to be eliminated. In any case, languages evolve over time and would undermine attempts to maintain control. People today often invent their own words and terms for things and events that do not extend to the main community. Also, thought cannot necessarily be controlled by words; even today, not all thoughts can be written down or described. Qualia would also serve as an obstacle. (A further possible complication would be that if someone did commit thoughtcrime, then it would be impossible for authorities to work out what it was they did).
Yes, all very true. Of course, Orwell did intend to write something of a satire in 1984, and so inherent weaknesses in the viability of Newspeak aren't really relevant, even if they are interesting. 88.111.194.96 13:09, 10 June 2007 (UTC)
For example, the Swedish Military jargon substitutes "unpeace" (Swedish: ofred) for "war", and "ungood" (Swedish: obra) for "bad".
These is only partially true.
"Obra" is pure post-1970s slang. It was not used when I served in the Swedish army in 1979 and no news paper editor today would let it slip into his paper unless as a direct quote.
"Ofred" is not military jargong, but a word only found today in high literary language. It sounds archaic and would hardly ever be found in the colloquial speech of the XXIst century. 193.15.73.3 14:33, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
I wonder how Monty Python's Dead Parrot sketch would be like in newspeak..."this parrot is dead! and it's dead! dead! more dead!" :) -- Dreamyshade
Oh, I can so picture that.
—Preceding unsigned comment added by 32.140.161.239 ( talk) 00:15, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
In Babylon Five, a term similar to this is used in the last episode of the fifth season [[User::wlievens|wlievens]] /
Orwell never wrote RealTruth nor GoodTruth, Joseph Michael Straczynski did, but the terminology is clearly parallel to NewSpeak. Powerseeking characters in Babylon 5, like the real fascistic chickenhawks who call themselves neocons tend to use newspeaklike language.
—
— Ŭalabio‽ 2005-07-05 23:38:17 (UTC)
"Newspeak is a fictional language in George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four." - So, how come that there are only a handful of examples of Newspeak from the novel, but whole passages on alledged "newspeak" in todays real world? Although I would personally agree that there may be some phenomena in todays world that can be thought of as to resemble Orwells Newspeak, I would think that this is higly dependent on your POV, and that this article is quite out of focus. -- 790 06:03, 2 August 2007 (UTC)
I have removed the passage now [3]. As it is a rather long passage, I'd like to give an additional explanation of my action. This article is about a fictional phenomenon in a novel. To relate this fiction to real-world penomena may not be alltogether senseless, but to be encyclopedically acceptable, such allegations have to be (a) sourced according to WP:REF and WP:NOR and (b) expressed in a way that does not obfuscate the fact that the novel and the real world are different things, and relations between them are subject to political, social, artistic and other points of view ( WP:NPOV). Both requirements were not fullfilled within several months, hence the deletion. -- 790 ( talk) 20:57, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
Ingsoc appears to be direct reference to Soviet era Russian language, which has hundreds of words constructed from first syllables: kolkhoz, glavlit, sovnarkom, politruk, chlenkor etc. Like kolkhoz comes from kollektivnoje hozjaistvo (collective economy). I did not edit the article as I have no proof that Orwell actually knew anything about Russian. Warbola ( talk) 20:58, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
Oldspeak is traditional english, or Standard English if you will. Newspeak is the corrupted language of Nineteen-eighty Four. Newspeak is the real deliberation of making up, or deleting new words, that are irrelevant, and that may cause thoughtcrime. I think they should be two different articles. The articles are exactly the same, there is no point to that. Oldspak is the languauge I am using now, Newspeak is all government, corporate, and military language, not the ORDINARY person. Thanks, and please try to change the articles instead of making them one and the SAME. They are two totally different concepts. Oldspeak, Standard English is traditional, and proper. Newspeak is simplified, unconventional, and not Standard English - besides, it has NO MEANING WHATSOEVER in the real world. 04:46, 6 May 2006 (UTC)~ User:Xinyu
I just noticed "favor" somewhere in the body of this article, and it occurred to me that the spelling in this article should reflect Orwell's own, and the usage of English actually in his novel, which would seem to be British spelling.....?? Reasons why this shouldn't be the case I'd be interested in hearing... Skookum1 ( talk) 17:46, 6 January 2009 (UTC)
How feasible would it be to maintain Newspeak given the human tendency to play with words, develop codes, jokes and so on? '...Surely every colour that is not white is unwhite...?' People have memories - and 'dreadful' is shorter than 'doubleplusungood.'
Could the development of Latin names for "plants, animals and other categories of living things" and similar mappings be seen as forms of Newspeak (being useful)?
Languages will always change - and some words will move from 'acceptable' to 'unacceptable' and are replaced by new words which experience the same phenomenon: it is the topics that are the problem rather than the words. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.104.132.41 ( talk) 15:39, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
The genesis of Newspeak can be found in the constructed language Basic English, which Orwell promoted from 1942 to 1944 before emphatically rejecting it in his essay "Politics and the English Language".[2]
This sentence must be wrong. (at least it doesn't follow from the source) Joepnl ( talk) 14:08, 13 May 2012 (UTC)
Could someone explain what "A vocabulary" and "B vocabulary" are? Several articles on Wikipedia mention them in reference to Newspeak, but the Newspeak article doesn't mention them at all. 70.20.149.174 ( talk) 06:58, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
The ultimate aim of Newspeak was to reduce even the dichotomies to a single word that was a "yes" of some sort: an obedient word with which everyone answered affirmatively to what was asked of them.
As far as I understand that claim, I can't see it supported from Orwell's appendix, so I've removed it. I think it's a misunderstanding of the way Oldspeak bad, worse, worst good, better, best are reduced to Newspeak ungood, ungooder, ungoodest, good, gooder, goodest i.e. dichotomies that use several roots in Oldspeak use one root in Newspeak, differentiated only by prefixes and suffixes. Weniwidiwiki84 ( talk) 09:18, 18 June 2012 (UTC)
Is the word 'copyvio' a part of newspeak? Is it a form of 'crimethink'?-- MathFacts ( talk) 21:12, 8 June 2009 (UTC) No,its wikipedia-jargon for "copyright violation". 75 * 18:22, 24 January 2013 (UTC)
Hi, I'm in a group of students at The Evergreen State College in Olympia, WA (USA). For a project in our Linguistics course, we're editing, cleaning up, and enhancing the Wikipedia page on Newspeak. Just letting everyone know who we are and what we're up to. Go Geoducks! Kadoru ( talk) 23:00, 7 March 2013 (UTC)
I cannot remember where I read it; but I remember coming across a discussion of Newspeak that stated, basically, that it would be impossible to maintain Newspeak as a language to control thought because of the nature of the human brain when it comes to language. People will create neologisms for things they don't have words for; and words that mean one thing can change to mean other related things. Words can also change in connotation. For example, "ungood" could easily change in meaning to mean "against the Party", giving the speaker a word for anti-government activity. The essay theorized that the actual result of Newspeak would not actually be the termination of thought, but the creation of two separate languages--the official Newspeak used in the media, and the Newspeak used in common conversation, especially by the Proles. If anyone can find a reference to this essay, I believe it would be a good addition to this article.-- 24.164.85.127 ( talk) 21:53, 15 November 2008 (UTC)
You are correct. Computer systems 'serialize' all language and images down to a language that consists of numbers only.
The reason that 'pearl clutching' types get worked up about this subject is because they only have a shallow understanding of what language really is. LegendLength ( talk) 10:32, 13 July 2013 (UTC)
This is almost certainly an example of the "abbreviated jargon — not actually Newspeak, but consisting largely of Newspeak words — which was used in the Ministry for internal purposes" described by Orwell in chapter 4, so there's no point in trying to parse it as if it were a sentence of full dictionary-approved official Newspeak (not to mention that it would be original research). AnonMoos ( talk) 18:36, 24 January 2014 (UTC)
A few thoughts about this section. First, I think the title could be better as it currently is somewhat unspecified (impact on what) and seems unrelated to the contents. Second, the sources to the first and third paragraphs are, in my opinion, questionable. Reference number four leads to a page that propagates clear political views and reference number six is a dead end. Third, the third paragraph of this section is, to me at least, ununderstandable. I find myself unable to find out what is being asserted and how it is related to the section or the article as a whole. Fourth, the second section's link to the impact of Newspeak should be elucidated. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.87.131.242 ( talk) 01:12, 26 January 2014 (UTC)
In some countries, e.g. Sweden, "Newspeak" translated as in the novel, is sometimes used in in politics as derogatory term for attempts of manipulating language, using euphemisms etc. According to [4] this occurs also in English, although googling only find a few examples, like this [5]. Can we write about this? -- BIL ( talk) 07:32, 21 October 2014 (UTC)
This may seem semantical, but shouldn't Oldspeak be called Unnewspeak based on the principles of Newspeak (i.e. no antonyms, the 'un' prefix)? 98.221.133.96 ( talk) 04:30, 8 October 2008 (UTC)
While Newspeak may have been created for a fictional work, several Newspeak words have entered the English language; possibly other languages. Even incomplete and very heavily reliant upon the English language, Newspeak is a functional constructed auxiliary language. -- IronMaidenRocks ( talk) 12:48, 12 April 2015 (UTC)
Regarding the paragraph starting "Orwell reveals a certain ignorance"... I can't speak for all agglutinative languages, but I speak a fair amount of Japanese and I think I can safely say that Japanese does not regard words with opposite meanings like "good" and "bad" as redundant, and they are in broad use as in English. In other words, although the word for not good ("yokunai") does resemble "ungood", Japanese still has a separate word for bad ("warui") and the meanings of both differ. The wording of the paragraph gives quite the opposite impression. -- Myxomatosis
I disagree with this as well. Also, if I had to pick one culture with a powerful controlling language that imposes strict cultural norms especially in the realm of respect to superiors, I would pick Japan. This paragraph to my mind disproves exactly what it set out to prove (probably in the name of political correctness, with its focus on ethnocentrism, and the irony should by now be evident). --Rgd
Para. beginnning "The real life pitfall of the Newspeak is, of course, that there are real-life agglutinative languages which act exactly as Orwell suggests, and the various suffixes, prefixes and derivatives allow almost endless possibilities for neologizising..." is awkward, purely speculative & unsubstantiated, and does not differentiate the core definition of agglutinative langs. (morphology) from Newspeak's syntactical construction. Should be removed if no one wishes to correct. KenThomas 06:14, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
Since Orwell wrote 1984 was written soon after he had switched from supporting Basic English to opposing it, and given Basic English explicitly support the un- formation and other compounds, I would have thought comments about other agglutinative languages influencing Newspeak would need credible external references.-- Rumping ( talk) 21:40, 28 November 2015 (UTC)
The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Newspeak/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.
Comment(s) | Press [show] to view → |
---|---|
===Bias and inappropriate debate ===
After reading the Newspeak article a couple of times and beginign to edit it, I decided not to. There are so many edits that need to be made to bring this in line with what an unbiased article should be, that it would be more appropriate to delete huge sections it than to attempt to salvage those paragraphs. In it's current incarnation, the article spends more time obfuscating what newspeak is with comparisons to other existing languages. This has almost no relevence to Newspeak. The point of Newspeak was that it it was a limited and corrupted version of English, and that a language with a smaller vocbulary makes it easier to use as a mind-control language. The incidental (or not) relationship to existing languages deserves nothing more than a side note. Not 4 paragraphs. One of the intents of Newspeak is to obfuscate clear though and debate. This article, ironically, does exactly that. It spends the majority of the first 2 pages attacking Orwel's concept Newspeak for it's passing resmblance to existing languages, and comes as close as an article can to an outright attack on the very subjet it should be explaining. The opening sections need a massive rewrite. |
Last edited at 04:57, 27 March 2007 (UTC). Substituted at 01:10, 30 April 2016 (UTC)
there is a problem with the quotation marks in the first paragraph...one too many or one too few...but I'm not sure how to fix it.... PurpleChez ( talk) 18:05, 9 December 2016 (UTC)
Please help at [ [6]] to create a Wikitionary for Newspeak/Oldspeak. You can also read the proposal on Meta-Wiki. Please help!
Admins, if this is contary to WP:CANVAS, please delete, but remember that it is just a guideline.
microchip08 18:28, 26 April 2007 (UTC)
Hi, in the article Newspeak you reverted two of my edits ( [7] [8]). In the first of your reverts ( [9]) you did not provide an edit summary at all, in the second case ( [10]) you gave the factual incorrect and misleading summary: "Factual correction; reverted opinion unsupported by the facts." Neither did I state any opinion in my edit, nor does my factually correct assertion that the work was published in 1949 need any sources (it wasn't sourced before, and it is well sourced in the linked article). Since such editing behaviour is considered unconstructive I ask you to stop your edit warring and either restore one of my proposed changes or find another variation which avoids that "Nineteen Eighty-Four" is directly followed by "(1949)", because this disturbs the flow as readers expect to read "(1984)" here and then stumble upon reading a different date. Alternatively, remove the "(1949)" completely, as it is not essential to the article. In general, regarding when it is okay to revert another editor and how to do it properly, these pages might be helpful: WP:ROWN, WP:RV, WP:REVERT. -- Matthiaspaul ( talk) 15:56, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
Should the precursor not be covered in more depth? -- Wikipietime ( talk) 22:03, 27 February 2017 (UTC)
The article and most of the discussion here seems to completely miss the point. 1984 is a satire. Newspeak is part of that satire, it is not meant to be taken seriously as a language. Newspeak satirizes the idea that a totalitarian regime tries to control the thoughts of their citizens by controlling their speech. In general it points out through satire how people try to control discussion, particularly political discussion, by controlling the language of the discussion.
Some of the passages in the book where they discuss Newspeak are funny. The idea to removing words from the language parallels the habit in the Soviet Union of removing people who had fallen out of favor from photographs. I do not believe that George Orwell thought that Newspeak would succeed as a means of controlling thought, what he is saying is that it is exactly the kind of thing that a totalitarian regime might try to do. Trying to change the language is a more radical and arresting idea than changing photographs. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.18.214.110 ( talk) 22:19, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
I have joined the fray, and also started discussion.
The removed section contains no sources - nor has it done so since first introduction in this edit here on 17th August. The edit summary stated "New section, links have to be added next" - but in 6 weeks that hasn't happened.
The section contains many inflammatory comments:
As pointed out, none of this is sourced or referenced anywhere. If it is to stay, it needs to be highly modified for tone and language before inclusion can be considered. Chaheel Riens ( talk) 10:26, 2 October 2017 (UTC)
This mess of a section came back, again. I went ahead and reverted it, as it seems to be consensus that it'll need major revision before it belongs here, if it's even salvageable. Perhaps it's time to consider stepping up the protection level? Eaglgenes101 ( talk) 04:07, 3 February 2018 (UTC)
It seems that is makes more sense to include the term "published in..." as part of the parenthetical (1949), otherwise it's possibly confusing as to why we have the statement "Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949)" - which doesn't make sense, and implies that Nineteen Eighty-Four somehow equals 1949.
Additionally the edit summaries used are at best inaccurate, and at worst outright false:
The date was not corrected, or even changed, and there is no opinion or POV in the phrase "published in"
With this edit - again it's not Original Research to say the novel was published in 1949 - if it is OR to say it was published in 1949, why is it then acceptable to leave in 1949 at all - but the hidden text is there for the benefit of editors to let them know why the text is there. The term "published in" is there for the reader, who has no interest in changing the article and just wants to know about Newspeak. Chaheel Riens ( talk) 21:36, 3 February 2018 (UTC)
Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified 3 external links on Newspeak. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
This message was posted before February 2018.
After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than
regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors
have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the
RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{
source check}}
(last update: 5 June 2024).
Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot ( Report bug) 02:01, 18 February 2018 (UTC)
The article contains two brutally contradictory assertions, both false:
In the Appendix: Principles of Newspeak, Orwell explicitly spells out that there is no set rule:
I have removed both untrue assertions. Scarabocchio ( talk) 19:25, 4 March 2018 (UTC)
"Newspeak is also a constructed language, of planned phonology, grammar, and vocabulary, like Basic English, which Orwell promoted (1942–44) during the Second World War (1939–45), and later rejected in the essay "Politics and the English Language" (1946), wherein he criticizes the bad usage of English in his day: dying metaphors, pretentious diction, and high-flown rhetoric, which produce the meaningless words of doublespeak, the product of unclear reasoning."
I'm not very good with english, but is this sentence not overly long? Someone who is into grammar and the like might want to correct either this or me.
89.160.243.36 ( talk) 00:23, 24 November 2019 (UTC)
Somewhere the article says that the assumption underlying newspeak is that if something can't be said it can't be thought. Surely this itself is a misassumption, because surely the point of newspeak is to narrow the range of communcation, therefore the range of communicated thought, therefore nearly all thought.
Reducing the vocab is like lowering the resolution of an image.
Inkstersco ( talk) 17:02, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
Is there a single-word English term that means "unable to express a thought or an idea due to the restrictions of the language in which it is to be explained?" Apart from, of course, the word Newspeak. Knaw 17:55, 29 March 2007 (UTC)
An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect 2984/New speak. Please participate in the redirect discussion if you wish to do so. 1234qwer1234qwer4 ( talk) 12:47, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
Could it be possible for someone to elaborate on real-life examples of Newspeak as well as connecting it to "political correctness" in a new section? I've already put up a new section to start. 97.70.186.205 ( talk) 17:41, 2 June 2020 (UTC)
All I can find are references to the principles, grammar and some vocabulary.
Nowhere in this article, or elsewhere online, can I find some actual examples of a Newspeak sentence - let alone a paragraph. This is a serious omission for what is supposed to be an encyclopædic article.
I have not read 1984, so could someone who has, possibly provide a quotation? EuroSong talk 18:18, 24 June 2020 (UTC)
This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 |
I am amazed that examples spreading racist terminology were not only left up for a year, but that when they were finally changed to terms that did not target any group by identity, but rather a point of view by choice, someone actually changed the page back! TWICE! Is it really that important to maintain a racist presentation of a political topic? -- surfergirl
The following paragraph (removed from the main article) needs NPOVing:
Another example is the attempt to rewrite the definition of the word " anti-Semitism". This word was coined in the late 1800s by a German author to refer specifically to the hatred of Jewish people; this terminology was intended to suggest that the hatred of Jews had a scientific basis. Since then this word has always meant hatred of Jews, and Jewish people alone. But in recent years anti-Semites themselves have begun to claim that this word actually means "hatred towards those who speak Semitic languages", which includes Arabs. Therefore, in this Newspeak, by definition no Arab can possibly be an anti-Semite. Against this pro-Israeli history writing rests the fact that Palestinians used this argument already in the early 20th century, when the word itself was new. Hence, the position of the pro-Israel camp is fundamentally flawed.
Given the controvery over the term "anti-Semitism" (especially as it has been used by non-semites to mean anti-arab which makes the arguement fall apart) maybe we should switch to a less controversial example. Possibly the word fundamentalism ? -- Imran 00:17 Nov 28, 2002 (UTC)
Jack Lynch,
I accept the change you made to "politically correct language, on the other hand, is said to have the goal of freeing individuals," etc. That seems fair enough to me. However, by the same standard, I see nothing wrong with the word "arguably" in the sentence, "Either way, there is arguably a resemblance between political correctness and Newspeak", etc; I have, therefore, put it back. R Lowry 20:10, 12 Dec 2003 (UTC)
The last few paragraphs should be moved to an article on Political correctness in general. I agree that "differently abled" is annoying, but that is a POV. (stand-up comedians have had a field day on it -- "dead" is now "differently alive", etc) It's wrong to state that "different" implies "different but equal". "differently able" can mean "less able": the point is that is doesn't automatically mean that. -- Tarquin
I have difficulty understanding the relevance of the following passsage of text:
In what sense is 'murder' an offensive term? And is 'collateral damage' really an example of politically correct terminology? An earlier version of this article contained the following text, which I think is far more informative:
This text was denounced as 'racist' and removed (see top of this Talk page) a little while ago, and eventually replaced with the 'collateral damage' example. I can understand why people might be hesitant to include an example containing racist terminology; surely, though, it is precisely the purpose of the example to demonstrate the contrast between a genuinely offensive term and its p.c. alternative. And, surely, in order to do that, the offensive term has to be included. R Lowry 22:25, 27 Jan 2004 (UTC)
"== Real-Life Examples of Newspeak ==
A comparison to Newspeak can be seen in political rhetoric, where two opposing sides string together phrases so empty of meaning that they may be compared to the taunts young children toss back and forth. The arguments of either side ultimately reduce to "I'm good; he's bad."
Charges of Newspeak are sometimes advanced when a group tries to replace a word/phrase that is politically incorrect (e.g. "civilian casualties") or offensive (e.g. "murder") with a politically correct or inoffensive one (e.g. " collateral damage"). Some maintain, in opposition to this practice, that to make certain words or phrases 'unspeakable' is tantamount to restricting what ideas may be held ( thoughtcrime). Others believe that expunging terms that have fallen out of favour or become insulting will make people less likely to hold outdated or offensive views.
Either way, there is arguably a resemblance between political correctness and Newspeak, although some will feel that they differ in their intentions: in Nineteen Eighty-Four, Newspeak is instituted to enhance the power of the state over the individual; politically correct language, on the other hand, is said to have the goal of freeing individuals from limitations imposed by preconceptions due to the use of certain terms. It is this attempt to change thought through changing (or eliminating) words that earns political correctness the perceived connection to Newspeak."
This IMO, is a mess. NPOV does not mean doubting every possible step along the way. Either Lowry and I need to come to some far better agreement, or preferably some others should become involved. JackLynch 02:09, 13 Dec 2003 (UTC)
I am leaving this version here, and putting my version in the article. Don't take it the wrong way, it is of course open to further edits, but I want my suggestion to have its chance. JackLynch 02:22, 13 Dec 2003 (UTC)
If, in China, unauthorized publishing of dictionaries is prohibited, there is, or should, be people who make their own dictionaries and distribute them electronically or something. Or non-Chinese should make a Chinese dictionary. Can we get some examples of just HOW Chinese words have been redefined? -- Zoe
It's also a little hard to distribute electronic dictionaries when you have the "Great Firewall of China" to deal with.~~Paul
E-prime has been viewed by some as a "simplified, Newspeak-like English"; I disagree with this and I've found it useful. I also find it more difficult to use than regular english. Use it as a tool, experiment with it; don't view it as law or as something enforced by a tyrannical government. I don't considerit a form of newspeak at all. -- unsigned
This article links to sexcrime which doesn't exist, but crimesex does. Which is correct? Graue 11:07, 20 May 2005 (UTC)
I don't think it's appropriate to label every new form of jargon, sociolect or dialect as newspeak. Isn't the term usually applied to forms of jargon and neologism that have some sort of political motivation, and come with some sort of taboo on not using them?
I removed the section on SMS "TXT SPK" as the connection to Newspeak is tenuous at best. If someone wishes this section to be included in the article please include some kind of explaination. 213.168.230.149 20:33, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
Most of the newspeak "word" articles consist of a paragraph or at two of rather redundant text and links to other newspeak word-articles. Most of these cannot properly be expanded, since they are hardly used outside of 1984 and are basically definitions. These should be merged in. Doublethink (and thoughtcrime) merits its own article since it has, ironically, entered the standard English vocabulary and is an important concept known beyond its literary context. The Ingsoc article is also substantial enough that it can probably stand on its own. Possibly prolefeed and unperson as well, if they are improved. The rest should be merged and redirected. I have already redirected the doubleplusungood article since that was the prior consensus and the redirect was replaced by a terrible writeup. NTK 20:20, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
Right folks, what's the big idea of having Newspeak language redirect to Newspeak, which in turn redirects to Oldspeak (Standard English), its total opposite, which in turn is actually an article about Newspeak (check the first bold word)? Fix it! 82.139.85.118 14:07, 6 May 2006 (UTC)
Looking through the past versions of Newspeak gives me the impression that the article hasn't evolved but rather deteriorated since the original entry. If anybody cares to keep the "Real-life examples" then serious thought should be given to exploit this in a separate article. Another option would be to create a new separate article just for Orwell's Newspeak. -- mic
I don't disagree that a resemblance between PC and Newspeak can be coherently argued; what I disliked was the blunt statement, "there is a resemblance", as though this were something that had been definitively proved. It can be argued equally coherently that the differences between PC and Newspeak are significant enough to make them, really, two different things. It's important to include both viewpoints in Wikipedia, without being seen to favour one or the other.
On a similar note: I think that your new sentence, "Of course it is this very attempt to change thought thru changing (or eliminating) words that earns political correctness the connection to Newspeak," is fine, but it could really do with the qualifying term "perceived" before the word "connection". Just my opinion. R Lowry 20:30, 12 Dec 2003 (UTC)
Query Newspeak link in Newspeak article. Malquote? Doubleplusungood ifso. --[Not signed, no date stamp]
"[A]im was to make subversive thought" -> "aim was to make all alternative thought". Cf.
duckspeak, Pynchon, and Fromm.
"The purpose of Newspeak was 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".[
Principles of Newspeak ] "The basic idea behind Newspeak was to remove all shades of meaning from language". [
Newspeak, from an afterword by
Erich Fromm in 2003 U.S. edition. (Content of the foreword by
Thomas Pynchon as well as the afterword is frequently plagiarized, as an engine search for key phrases demonstrates.) ]
"Newspeak words", whether merge into the main article: yes, more intuitive also. Could still hyperlink.
"See also", + link to article on source since Newspeak discussed there also.
Bug: ref="multiple, 2003 ed." command or ref="2003" command per
Multiple uses DNF. Kludge: "ref" command used instead, generates duplicate in "Notes and References" section.
References manually generated as a backup. Format per
MoS.
Pynchon and Fromm referenced are frequently plagiarized elsewhere on the Web. {{
Citation needed}} in article at relevant text.
Link
Totalitarian Language: Orwell's Newspeak and Its Nazi and Communist Antecedents not found so moved here until created.
"External Links" -> "Further Reading", per MoS
Further reading/external links.
"Retrieved [date]", since on-line reference links break (per
Embedded links)
Original wording retained as could. Might be shortened.
-- GoDot 01:28, 8 May 2006 (UTC)
"Politically correct" can be seen as a phrase in conservative newspeak meant to allude to orwellian nightmares. To me, labelling a group of people as "niggers" also appears as politically charged.
I argue that no neutral language seems to exist; all languages looks shaped by (and if sapir-whorf is correct, shapes) their culture and the intentions of their speakers. Sometimes intentionally ("collateral damage", "politically correct", "womyn") and sometimes unintentionally ("nigger").
I consider "charging the opposite view with allegations of newspeak" as a form of newspeak itself.
Davin Bacon 00:16, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
The term "Politically Correct" is far too loaded, in my mind, to be used extensively in that secion. Instead of "Politically Correct Euphamisms," I propose changing it to something like "Political Euphamisms," and mentioning "political correctness" as just one example some cite of such euphamisms. For one thing, the term itself is generally used to charicature liberals; "collateral damage" is not an example of the term PC as is most commonly used. It bears mentioning, but not to such an extent. MRig 04:50, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
Finishing reading the article, I was reminded of l33t-speek, but really more so just "teen-speak". Try to talk to someone which is really "into" that, and you get nothing out from them, just "brb lol afk back thx asl", but then, did teens ever speak about big things (I know this can sound condescenting, but...)?
But then we have the adult version: just talking about the weather, and one of my favorite (anon) quotes:
"my biggest fear is that one day we will meet eachother on the street and have an artificial conversation".
One could say "artificial" is PC/new-speak because you say what you think is "right", what will not offend anyone, and also it will always spark discussion. You think, you have to say something to this person, when you meet them, you have to say something nice, something light. In this way, emotions are removed from language, from communicating, and if you never talk strongly about things "oooh (celebrity) is so sexy on (tv show) and did you see his fight with (other celebrity)" you could never try to change the world. Well, except to give yourself more money/power...
But then also in relation which might not seem logically so:
"We are so vain that we care for the opinion of those we don't care for"
- Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach (Adjust your speech, your character, your everything, to "how you think" you're supposed to act. Ok. Nevermind)
--
Seas 21:39, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Thats an excellent point, I don't suppose you've read Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451? ~~Paul
I don't understand how l33t can be considered a form of Newspeak. I can't see any significant similarity in the way l33t and Newspeak "substitute words and phrases" as the article says. Could someone please give examples of some l33t words/phrases which are Newspeak-like, and explain to me why the relationship between l33t and Newspeak is significant? -- Jibjibjib 07:24, 2 February 2006 (UTC)
Should spelling checkers be added in here as an example of it in real life? eg I used to spell really well, but now I have MS word my grasp of spelling has deteriorated. I find the same with grammer. Auto correct does the same. i am now almost unable to spell entreprenuer, always getting the e & u around the wrong way. I dont think its unreasonable that people in the near future will be dependent on machines to use their own languages correctly 222.155.79.66 04:36, 1 April 2007 (UTC)
This section seems unnecessary, about half the paragraph explains that the book doesn't contain Newspeak, the other half is tortured reasoning about why some of it could be interpreted to have the same effect as Newspeak.
And then, of course, there is the whole missing spoilers warning, if I understadn wikiprotocol correctly.
And the abbreviations used in the Kornbluth story are very directly based on those actually used in telegraphic communication at the time, due to the policy of charging on a per-word basis. Kornbluth in fact worked as a wire-service rewrite man, and was celarly imitatign the dispatches he saw on a daily basis. DES (talk) 23:08, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
This is so obviously irrelevant for the reasons above that I've removed it. It seems to have been added by Adam Keller but he doesn't interact on his talk page (or here it seems) so I haven't told him. 88.111.85.129 05:38, 9 June 2007 (UTC)
the two paragraphs about the failings of newspeak really have no place here without an outside citation. they read exactly as if someone decided to stick a condensed version of a term paper into the article. the criticism is fine, though there are several comments above which present a good case for it being incorrect, but it needs to have a traceable origin. i move to remove these sections altogether and put out a request for newspeak criticism. 209.169.48.66 23:30, 1 May 2007 (UTC)
The real life pitfall of the Newspeak is, of course, that there are real-life agglutinative languages which act exactly as Orwell suggests, and the various suffixes, prefixes and derivatives allow almost endless possibilities for neologizising. Instead of shackling the thought, Newspeak actually just enhances the possibilities of expression of its speakers. Certain languages, such as Finnish, Japanese or Hungarian, work almost perfectly on the Newspeak principles — they have very sparse basic vocabularies, but almost all the expressions are derived from the stem words by various prefixes and suffixes.
But again the real-life pitfall of the agglutinative languages looms here: agglutinative languages, like Finnish language, offer almost endless possibilities to neologize an expression or a word by using just basic vocabulary and the various prefixes and suffixes. A concept which is not assumed to exist is easy to conceive by using a word root and derivative prefixes or suffixes. The concept of "freedom" (Finnish vapaus) would be easy to conceive by using expression omaehtoepäestoisuus ("own-condition-un-hinder-ity") where the only word roots needed would be "ehto" (condition) and "esto" (hinder), and the word still would be perfectly understandable Finnish, albeit clumsy. In Newspeak this would be avoided by removing, for example, the word own (and possible hinder) from the language, since in a world where no personal possession or even private thought is possible, there would be no need for a word like own. Similarly, Oldspeak words may be stripped of certain meanings while retaining others, such that though it would be possible to say the weather is good, the phrase the Party is ungood would be meaningless. Even so, it is unlikely that such complete control would be technically possible; even if the expression "the Party is ungood" does not normally make sense, groups of rebels could slightly alter their language to make it make sense. Even if the word "own" is removed, then a word could be formulated that meant "condition-of-person-not-hindered-by-other-people". "Uprising" could be represented by "people-making-attack-on-Party". To fully remove this possibility would be impossible; as long as the words "Party", "people" and "attack" exist, they could be made to say "People-attack-party". To remove thoughtcrime, practically all words would have to be eliminated. In any case, languages evolve over time and would undermine attempts to maintain control. People today often invent their own words and terms for things and events that do not extend to the main community. Also, thought cannot necessarily be controlled by words; even today, not all thoughts can be written down or described. Qualia would also serve as an obstacle. (A further possible complication would be that if someone did commit thoughtcrime, then it would be impossible for authorities to work out what it was they did).
Yes, all very true. Of course, Orwell did intend to write something of a satire in 1984, and so inherent weaknesses in the viability of Newspeak aren't really relevant, even if they are interesting. 88.111.194.96 13:09, 10 June 2007 (UTC)
For example, the Swedish Military jargon substitutes "unpeace" (Swedish: ofred) for "war", and "ungood" (Swedish: obra) for "bad".
These is only partially true.
"Obra" is pure post-1970s slang. It was not used when I served in the Swedish army in 1979 and no news paper editor today would let it slip into his paper unless as a direct quote.
"Ofred" is not military jargong, but a word only found today in high literary language. It sounds archaic and would hardly ever be found in the colloquial speech of the XXIst century. 193.15.73.3 14:33, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
I wonder how Monty Python's Dead Parrot sketch would be like in newspeak..."this parrot is dead! and it's dead! dead! more dead!" :) -- Dreamyshade
Oh, I can so picture that.
—Preceding unsigned comment added by 32.140.161.239 ( talk) 00:15, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
In Babylon Five, a term similar to this is used in the last episode of the fifth season [[User::wlievens|wlievens]] /
Orwell never wrote RealTruth nor GoodTruth, Joseph Michael Straczynski did, but the terminology is clearly parallel to NewSpeak. Powerseeking characters in Babylon 5, like the real fascistic chickenhawks who call themselves neocons tend to use newspeaklike language.
—
— Ŭalabio‽ 2005-07-05 23:38:17 (UTC)
"Newspeak is a fictional language in George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four." - So, how come that there are only a handful of examples of Newspeak from the novel, but whole passages on alledged "newspeak" in todays real world? Although I would personally agree that there may be some phenomena in todays world that can be thought of as to resemble Orwells Newspeak, I would think that this is higly dependent on your POV, and that this article is quite out of focus. -- 790 06:03, 2 August 2007 (UTC)
I have removed the passage now [3]. As it is a rather long passage, I'd like to give an additional explanation of my action. This article is about a fictional phenomenon in a novel. To relate this fiction to real-world penomena may not be alltogether senseless, but to be encyclopedically acceptable, such allegations have to be (a) sourced according to WP:REF and WP:NOR and (b) expressed in a way that does not obfuscate the fact that the novel and the real world are different things, and relations between them are subject to political, social, artistic and other points of view ( WP:NPOV). Both requirements were not fullfilled within several months, hence the deletion. -- 790 ( talk) 20:57, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
Ingsoc appears to be direct reference to Soviet era Russian language, which has hundreds of words constructed from first syllables: kolkhoz, glavlit, sovnarkom, politruk, chlenkor etc. Like kolkhoz comes from kollektivnoje hozjaistvo (collective economy). I did not edit the article as I have no proof that Orwell actually knew anything about Russian. Warbola ( talk) 20:58, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
Oldspeak is traditional english, or Standard English if you will. Newspeak is the corrupted language of Nineteen-eighty Four. Newspeak is the real deliberation of making up, or deleting new words, that are irrelevant, and that may cause thoughtcrime. I think they should be two different articles. The articles are exactly the same, there is no point to that. Oldspak is the languauge I am using now, Newspeak is all government, corporate, and military language, not the ORDINARY person. Thanks, and please try to change the articles instead of making them one and the SAME. They are two totally different concepts. Oldspeak, Standard English is traditional, and proper. Newspeak is simplified, unconventional, and not Standard English - besides, it has NO MEANING WHATSOEVER in the real world. 04:46, 6 May 2006 (UTC)~ User:Xinyu
I just noticed "favor" somewhere in the body of this article, and it occurred to me that the spelling in this article should reflect Orwell's own, and the usage of English actually in his novel, which would seem to be British spelling.....?? Reasons why this shouldn't be the case I'd be interested in hearing... Skookum1 ( talk) 17:46, 6 January 2009 (UTC)
How feasible would it be to maintain Newspeak given the human tendency to play with words, develop codes, jokes and so on? '...Surely every colour that is not white is unwhite...?' People have memories - and 'dreadful' is shorter than 'doubleplusungood.'
Could the development of Latin names for "plants, animals and other categories of living things" and similar mappings be seen as forms of Newspeak (being useful)?
Languages will always change - and some words will move from 'acceptable' to 'unacceptable' and are replaced by new words which experience the same phenomenon: it is the topics that are the problem rather than the words. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.104.132.41 ( talk) 15:39, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
The genesis of Newspeak can be found in the constructed language Basic English, which Orwell promoted from 1942 to 1944 before emphatically rejecting it in his essay "Politics and the English Language".[2]
This sentence must be wrong. (at least it doesn't follow from the source) Joepnl ( talk) 14:08, 13 May 2012 (UTC)
Could someone explain what "A vocabulary" and "B vocabulary" are? Several articles on Wikipedia mention them in reference to Newspeak, but the Newspeak article doesn't mention them at all. 70.20.149.174 ( talk) 06:58, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
The ultimate aim of Newspeak was to reduce even the dichotomies to a single word that was a "yes" of some sort: an obedient word with which everyone answered affirmatively to what was asked of them.
As far as I understand that claim, I can't see it supported from Orwell's appendix, so I've removed it. I think it's a misunderstanding of the way Oldspeak bad, worse, worst good, better, best are reduced to Newspeak ungood, ungooder, ungoodest, good, gooder, goodest i.e. dichotomies that use several roots in Oldspeak use one root in Newspeak, differentiated only by prefixes and suffixes. Weniwidiwiki84 ( talk) 09:18, 18 June 2012 (UTC)
Is the word 'copyvio' a part of newspeak? Is it a form of 'crimethink'?-- MathFacts ( talk) 21:12, 8 June 2009 (UTC) No,its wikipedia-jargon for "copyright violation". 75 * 18:22, 24 January 2013 (UTC)
Hi, I'm in a group of students at The Evergreen State College in Olympia, WA (USA). For a project in our Linguistics course, we're editing, cleaning up, and enhancing the Wikipedia page on Newspeak. Just letting everyone know who we are and what we're up to. Go Geoducks! Kadoru ( talk) 23:00, 7 March 2013 (UTC)
I cannot remember where I read it; but I remember coming across a discussion of Newspeak that stated, basically, that it would be impossible to maintain Newspeak as a language to control thought because of the nature of the human brain when it comes to language. People will create neologisms for things they don't have words for; and words that mean one thing can change to mean other related things. Words can also change in connotation. For example, "ungood" could easily change in meaning to mean "against the Party", giving the speaker a word for anti-government activity. The essay theorized that the actual result of Newspeak would not actually be the termination of thought, but the creation of two separate languages--the official Newspeak used in the media, and the Newspeak used in common conversation, especially by the Proles. If anyone can find a reference to this essay, I believe it would be a good addition to this article.-- 24.164.85.127 ( talk) 21:53, 15 November 2008 (UTC)
You are correct. Computer systems 'serialize' all language and images down to a language that consists of numbers only.
The reason that 'pearl clutching' types get worked up about this subject is because they only have a shallow understanding of what language really is. LegendLength ( talk) 10:32, 13 July 2013 (UTC)
This is almost certainly an example of the "abbreviated jargon — not actually Newspeak, but consisting largely of Newspeak words — which was used in the Ministry for internal purposes" described by Orwell in chapter 4, so there's no point in trying to parse it as if it were a sentence of full dictionary-approved official Newspeak (not to mention that it would be original research). AnonMoos ( talk) 18:36, 24 January 2014 (UTC)
A few thoughts about this section. First, I think the title could be better as it currently is somewhat unspecified (impact on what) and seems unrelated to the contents. Second, the sources to the first and third paragraphs are, in my opinion, questionable. Reference number four leads to a page that propagates clear political views and reference number six is a dead end. Third, the third paragraph of this section is, to me at least, ununderstandable. I find myself unable to find out what is being asserted and how it is related to the section or the article as a whole. Fourth, the second section's link to the impact of Newspeak should be elucidated. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.87.131.242 ( talk) 01:12, 26 January 2014 (UTC)
In some countries, e.g. Sweden, "Newspeak" translated as in the novel, is sometimes used in in politics as derogatory term for attempts of manipulating language, using euphemisms etc. According to [4] this occurs also in English, although googling only find a few examples, like this [5]. Can we write about this? -- BIL ( talk) 07:32, 21 October 2014 (UTC)
This may seem semantical, but shouldn't Oldspeak be called Unnewspeak based on the principles of Newspeak (i.e. no antonyms, the 'un' prefix)? 98.221.133.96 ( talk) 04:30, 8 October 2008 (UTC)
While Newspeak may have been created for a fictional work, several Newspeak words have entered the English language; possibly other languages. Even incomplete and very heavily reliant upon the English language, Newspeak is a functional constructed auxiliary language. -- IronMaidenRocks ( talk) 12:48, 12 April 2015 (UTC)
Regarding the paragraph starting "Orwell reveals a certain ignorance"... I can't speak for all agglutinative languages, but I speak a fair amount of Japanese and I think I can safely say that Japanese does not regard words with opposite meanings like "good" and "bad" as redundant, and they are in broad use as in English. In other words, although the word for not good ("yokunai") does resemble "ungood", Japanese still has a separate word for bad ("warui") and the meanings of both differ. The wording of the paragraph gives quite the opposite impression. -- Myxomatosis
I disagree with this as well. Also, if I had to pick one culture with a powerful controlling language that imposes strict cultural norms especially in the realm of respect to superiors, I would pick Japan. This paragraph to my mind disproves exactly what it set out to prove (probably in the name of political correctness, with its focus on ethnocentrism, and the irony should by now be evident). --Rgd
Para. beginnning "The real life pitfall of the Newspeak is, of course, that there are real-life agglutinative languages which act exactly as Orwell suggests, and the various suffixes, prefixes and derivatives allow almost endless possibilities for neologizising..." is awkward, purely speculative & unsubstantiated, and does not differentiate the core definition of agglutinative langs. (morphology) from Newspeak's syntactical construction. Should be removed if no one wishes to correct. KenThomas 06:14, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
Since Orwell wrote 1984 was written soon after he had switched from supporting Basic English to opposing it, and given Basic English explicitly support the un- formation and other compounds, I would have thought comments about other agglutinative languages influencing Newspeak would need credible external references.-- Rumping ( talk) 21:40, 28 November 2015 (UTC)
The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Newspeak/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.
Comment(s) | Press [show] to view → |
---|---|
===Bias and inappropriate debate ===
After reading the Newspeak article a couple of times and beginign to edit it, I decided not to. There are so many edits that need to be made to bring this in line with what an unbiased article should be, that it would be more appropriate to delete huge sections it than to attempt to salvage those paragraphs. In it's current incarnation, the article spends more time obfuscating what newspeak is with comparisons to other existing languages. This has almost no relevence to Newspeak. The point of Newspeak was that it it was a limited and corrupted version of English, and that a language with a smaller vocbulary makes it easier to use as a mind-control language. The incidental (or not) relationship to existing languages deserves nothing more than a side note. Not 4 paragraphs. One of the intents of Newspeak is to obfuscate clear though and debate. This article, ironically, does exactly that. It spends the majority of the first 2 pages attacking Orwel's concept Newspeak for it's passing resmblance to existing languages, and comes as close as an article can to an outright attack on the very subjet it should be explaining. The opening sections need a massive rewrite. |
Last edited at 04:57, 27 March 2007 (UTC). Substituted at 01:10, 30 April 2016 (UTC)
there is a problem with the quotation marks in the first paragraph...one too many or one too few...but I'm not sure how to fix it.... PurpleChez ( talk) 18:05, 9 December 2016 (UTC)
Please help at [ [6]] to create a Wikitionary for Newspeak/Oldspeak. You can also read the proposal on Meta-Wiki. Please help!
Admins, if this is contary to WP:CANVAS, please delete, but remember that it is just a guideline.
microchip08 18:28, 26 April 2007 (UTC)
Hi, in the article Newspeak you reverted two of my edits ( [7] [8]). In the first of your reverts ( [9]) you did not provide an edit summary at all, in the second case ( [10]) you gave the factual incorrect and misleading summary: "Factual correction; reverted opinion unsupported by the facts." Neither did I state any opinion in my edit, nor does my factually correct assertion that the work was published in 1949 need any sources (it wasn't sourced before, and it is well sourced in the linked article). Since such editing behaviour is considered unconstructive I ask you to stop your edit warring and either restore one of my proposed changes or find another variation which avoids that "Nineteen Eighty-Four" is directly followed by "(1949)", because this disturbs the flow as readers expect to read "(1984)" here and then stumble upon reading a different date. Alternatively, remove the "(1949)" completely, as it is not essential to the article. In general, regarding when it is okay to revert another editor and how to do it properly, these pages might be helpful: WP:ROWN, WP:RV, WP:REVERT. -- Matthiaspaul ( talk) 15:56, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
Should the precursor not be covered in more depth? -- Wikipietime ( talk) 22:03, 27 February 2017 (UTC)
The article and most of the discussion here seems to completely miss the point. 1984 is a satire. Newspeak is part of that satire, it is not meant to be taken seriously as a language. Newspeak satirizes the idea that a totalitarian regime tries to control the thoughts of their citizens by controlling their speech. In general it points out through satire how people try to control discussion, particularly political discussion, by controlling the language of the discussion.
Some of the passages in the book where they discuss Newspeak are funny. The idea to removing words from the language parallels the habit in the Soviet Union of removing people who had fallen out of favor from photographs. I do not believe that George Orwell thought that Newspeak would succeed as a means of controlling thought, what he is saying is that it is exactly the kind of thing that a totalitarian regime might try to do. Trying to change the language is a more radical and arresting idea than changing photographs. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.18.214.110 ( talk) 22:19, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
I have joined the fray, and also started discussion.
The removed section contains no sources - nor has it done so since first introduction in this edit here on 17th August. The edit summary stated "New section, links have to be added next" - but in 6 weeks that hasn't happened.
The section contains many inflammatory comments:
As pointed out, none of this is sourced or referenced anywhere. If it is to stay, it needs to be highly modified for tone and language before inclusion can be considered. Chaheel Riens ( talk) 10:26, 2 October 2017 (UTC)
This mess of a section came back, again. I went ahead and reverted it, as it seems to be consensus that it'll need major revision before it belongs here, if it's even salvageable. Perhaps it's time to consider stepping up the protection level? Eaglgenes101 ( talk) 04:07, 3 February 2018 (UTC)
It seems that is makes more sense to include the term "published in..." as part of the parenthetical (1949), otherwise it's possibly confusing as to why we have the statement "Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949)" - which doesn't make sense, and implies that Nineteen Eighty-Four somehow equals 1949.
Additionally the edit summaries used are at best inaccurate, and at worst outright false:
The date was not corrected, or even changed, and there is no opinion or POV in the phrase "published in"
With this edit - again it's not Original Research to say the novel was published in 1949 - if it is OR to say it was published in 1949, why is it then acceptable to leave in 1949 at all - but the hidden text is there for the benefit of editors to let them know why the text is there. The term "published in" is there for the reader, who has no interest in changing the article and just wants to know about Newspeak. Chaheel Riens ( talk) 21:36, 3 February 2018 (UTC)
Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified 3 external links on Newspeak. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
This message was posted before February 2018.
After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than
regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors
have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the
RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{
source check}}
(last update: 5 June 2024).
Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot ( Report bug) 02:01, 18 February 2018 (UTC)
The article contains two brutally contradictory assertions, both false:
In the Appendix: Principles of Newspeak, Orwell explicitly spells out that there is no set rule:
I have removed both untrue assertions. Scarabocchio ( talk) 19:25, 4 March 2018 (UTC)
"Newspeak is also a constructed language, of planned phonology, grammar, and vocabulary, like Basic English, which Orwell promoted (1942–44) during the Second World War (1939–45), and later rejected in the essay "Politics and the English Language" (1946), wherein he criticizes the bad usage of English in his day: dying metaphors, pretentious diction, and high-flown rhetoric, which produce the meaningless words of doublespeak, the product of unclear reasoning."
I'm not very good with english, but is this sentence not overly long? Someone who is into grammar and the like might want to correct either this or me.
89.160.243.36 ( talk) 00:23, 24 November 2019 (UTC)
Somewhere the article says that the assumption underlying newspeak is that if something can't be said it can't be thought. Surely this itself is a misassumption, because surely the point of newspeak is to narrow the range of communcation, therefore the range of communicated thought, therefore nearly all thought.
Reducing the vocab is like lowering the resolution of an image.
Inkstersco ( talk) 17:02, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
Is there a single-word English term that means "unable to express a thought or an idea due to the restrictions of the language in which it is to be explained?" Apart from, of course, the word Newspeak. Knaw 17:55, 29 March 2007 (UTC)
An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect 2984/New speak. Please participate in the redirect discussion if you wish to do so. 1234qwer1234qwer4 ( talk) 12:47, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
Could it be possible for someone to elaborate on real-life examples of Newspeak as well as connecting it to "political correctness" in a new section? I've already put up a new section to start. 97.70.186.205 ( talk) 17:41, 2 June 2020 (UTC)
All I can find are references to the principles, grammar and some vocabulary.
Nowhere in this article, or elsewhere online, can I find some actual examples of a Newspeak sentence - let alone a paragraph. This is a serious omission for what is supposed to be an encyclopædic article.
I have not read 1984, so could someone who has, possibly provide a quotation? EuroSong talk 18:18, 24 June 2020 (UTC)