Politics and English Language – Emely Aguero

In the essay ” Politics and the English Language” written by George Orwell he makes some important points about the english language. In his essay he speaks about how over time the english language has become ” inaccurate and ugly.” He says that the decline of the english language has to do a lot with political and economic issues. Although theres a significant decline in our language there is still hope. He says ” Modern English, especially written English, is full of bad habits which spread by imitation and which can be avoided if one is willing to take the necessary trouble.” From this quote which I find very significant he’s also letting it be known that not only have we been loosing the English Language but we have been loosing our originality right now we are just reading and listening to peoples mistakes and repeating them. Orwell says that political language ” is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectful…” Our language has become vague and meaningless. In politics language has been used to cover up the truth. To tell a story but not really tell it. In his essay he says ” In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible. Things like the continuance of British rule in India, the Russian purges and deportations, the dropping of the atom bombs on Japan, can indeed be defended, but only by arguments which are too brutal for most people to face, and which do not square with the professed aims of political parties.” Political parties will take events like this and sugarcoat it without having to get into details of what actually happened and then having their people believe what they want. We see this all the time in modern day politics. For example ” let’s build a wall” became a very famous phrase as Trump continued to use it during his candidacy. But what exactly does that mean? Saying ” let’s build a wall” doesn’t specify on how immigrants are going to be treated. It doesn’t say that Children and families will be detained which continues to occur. People in power use the English language in their favor. I personally am guilty of a lot of the things that Orwell mentions. For example I might say that I am a christian but I won’t mention certain things I can’t do or i’ll hide some truth to it. It is something that comes pretty natural to people not because they want to lie or be vague but they fear disapproval. I feel like having that fear has also played a big factor on why the English language has declined. I feel like George Orwells critique is valid and he has a good point.