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Teaching George Orwell in Karl Rove''s World: Politics and the English Language in the 21st Century Classroom
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Teaching George Orwell in Karl Rove’s World:
“Politics and the English Language” in the 21
st
Century Classroom
William Haltom and Hans Ostrom
Introduction
“Politics and the English Language” has long been a celebrated resource for English
composition and introductory political science courses as well as a fixture in intellectual discourse.
1
In that essay George Orwell concisely diagnosed problems and prescribed remedies
in the form of six guidelines. Orwell argued that these remedies, and recommitment to sincerity and concreteness that the remedies would promote, could improve not only prose but also belief and thought. Thinkers and writers have rejoiced ever since.
In this paper we argue that when Orwell set down his small steps for speakers and
writers, he neglected some giant leaps that the politicallinguistic culture had made, was making, and would make. Beset by propaganda that has often transmogrified Orwell’s 1984 and Animal Farm from dystopias to primers; by public relations that has supplanted the concrete and confirmable with pseudoevents, imagery, and truthiness; by a punditocracy that has suffused print media, television, the Internet, and the blogosphere with infotaining banter and blather; and by fragmentation via novel means of communication, such as instant messenging
2
– to settle for a short list – our students and we must update Orwell’s essay as it
nears 65. That is the timid thesis of our paper. Our bolder thesis is that Orwell’s diagnoses and prescriptions must be radically reconsidered and generously supplemented in light of the politics of the American language.
In this paper, we first rehearse virtues of “Politics and the English Language” (here
after PEL) for writers and for students of writing but caution that those virtues are contextual and contestable.
3
We then observe that Orwell scants politics despite the title of the essay.
4
We, third, argue that his prescribed treatment for what ails people and language proved insufficient and perhaps pernicious, the figurative equivalent of a topical ointment used to treat afflictions that lie deep within the bodies of politics and media. Assuming we have interpreted PEL correctly, Orwell’s essay addressed enormous political and mediarelated problems with tricks from the professional writer’s trade. We acknowledge that, in some rhetorical situations and professional settings, the tricks work well insofar as they produce pithier, less deceptive prose than might otherwise be the case. We concede as well that the
1
See, for a recent example, Randy Cohen’s almost casual allusion to Orwell’s essay in “The Ethicist: Truth in
Suspension,” The New York Times Magazine 12509 p. 14: “Another way to phrase your question: is it acceptable to use deliberately deceptive language to a college admissions office? I’m going to go with — oh, you know. I’m going to go with George Orwell’s ‘Politics and the English Language.’ School officials should be required to read it when they’re ‘at the beach.’ ” See also Jeffrey Feldman’s Outright Barbarous (New York: IG Publishing, 2008), which derives its title from Orwell’s sixth rule for writing in the essay and Geoffrey Nunberg’s Going Nucular (New York: Public Affairs, 2004) pp. 121125. We could amass other citations to Orwell’s essay, but the references above occur in outlets not exclusively academic and so make our point.
2
We doubt that Orwell would have welcomed the frequently heard “messenging” – a participial back
formation from the hitherto nonexistent verb “to messenger,” we imagine – to the lexicon.
3
Tempted to the waggish “not unproblematic,” we decided to break as few of Orwell’s rules as we can.
4
We mean to be helpful rather than churlish when we note that Orwell draws his examples from academic
prose, political pamphlets, and a letter (which does not concern politics) to a newspaper and so does not restrict himself to political prose.
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| | Authors: Ostrom, Hans. and Haltom, William. |
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Teaching George Orwell in Karl Rove’s World:
“Politics and the English Language” in the 21
st
Century Classroom
William Haltom and Hans Ostrom
Introduction
“Politics and the English Language” has long been a celebrated resource for English
composition and introductory political science courses as well as a fixture in intellectual dis
course.
In that essay George Orwell concisely diagnosed problems and prescribed remedies
in the form of six guidelines. Orwell argued that these remedies, and recommitment to sin
cerity and concreteness that the remedies would promote, could improve not only prose but
also belief and thought. Thinkers and writers have rejoiced ever since.
In this paper we argue that when Orwell set down his small steps for speakers and
writers, he neglected some giant leaps that the politicallinguistic culture had made, was
making, and would make. Beset by propaganda that has often transmogrified Orwell’s 1984
and Animal Farm from dystopias to primers; by public relations that has supplanted the con
crete and confirmable with pseudoevents, imagery, and truthiness; by a punditocracy that
has suffused print media, television, the Internet, and the blogosphere with infotaining banter
and blather; and by fragmentation via novel means of communication, such as instant mes
senging
– to settle for a short list – our students and we must update Orwell’s essay as it
nears 65. That is the timid thesis of our paper. Our bolder thesis is that Orwell’s diagnoses
and prescriptions must be radically reconsidered and generously supplemented in light of the
politics of the American language.
In this paper, we first rehearse virtues of “Politics and the English Language” (here
after PEL) for writers and for students of writing but caution that those virtues are contextual
and contestable.
We then observe that Orwell scants politics despite the title of the essay.
We, third, argue that his prescribed treatment for what ails people and language proved insuf
ficient and perhaps pernicious, the figurative equivalent of a topical ointment used to treat
afflictions that lie deep within the bodies of politics and media. Assuming we have inter
preted PEL correctly, Orwell’s essay addressed enormous political and mediarelated prob
lems with tricks from the professional writer’s trade. We acknowledge that, in some rhe
torical situations and professional settings, the tricks work well insofar as they produce
pithier, less deceptive prose than might otherwise be the case. We concede as well that the
1
See, for a recent example, Randy Cohen’s almost casual allusion to Orwell’s essay in “The Ethicist: Truth in
Suspension,” The New York Times Magazine 12509 p. 14: “Another way to phrase your question: is it accep
table to use deliberately deceptive language to a college admissions office? I’m going to go with — oh, you
know. I’m going to go with George Orwell’s ‘Politics and the English Language.’ School officials should be
required to read it when they’re ‘at the beach.’ ” See also Jeffrey Feldman’s Outright Barbarous (New York:
IG Publishing, 2008), which derives its title from Orwell’s sixth rule for writing in the essay and Geoffrey
Nunberg’s Going Nucular (New York: Public Affairs, 2004) pp. 121125. We could amass other citations to
Orwell’s essay, but the references above occur in outlets not exclusively academic and so make our point.
2
We doubt that Orwell would have welcomed the frequently heard “messenging” – a participial back
formation from the hitherto nonexistent verb “to messenger,” we imagine – to the lexicon.
3
Tempted to the waggish “not unproblematic,” we decided to break as few of Orwell’s rules as we can.
4
We mean to be helpful rather than churlish when we note that Orwell draws his examples from academic
prose, political pamphlets, and a letter (which does not concern politics) to a newspaper and so does not restrict
himself to political prose.
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