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Stumbling across the internet, I came across this essay by Orwell, which deals with the decadence of language and the way it affects not only the way we form our thoughts (a la 1984), but our political and cultural life as well.
The most important points of the article, as I understand it, are these:
I'm not sure if I agree totally on point number 3, or if it just applies to the English language. I cannot think of a time when the Spanish language was more beautiful than the Siglo de Oro, where language was used in the most complex ways imaginable. Read any poem by Góngora and, at first, you'll be both fascinated and mystified. Yet, those writers were able to use the words in those ways because they knew the exact meanings of those words.
There is no doubt that this misuse of language is a huge problem nowadays (corporate speak, anyone? hell, you don't have to go any further than the P&CE forums), and that some people deliberately misconstrue the language to sound like they are saying something without adding anything to the conversation.
Any thoughts on this?
The most important points of the article, as I understand it, are these:
- The decadence in the English language is caused by laziness, which has made wrongful use of stock phrases and words that no longer carry any meaning to give the illusion that one is saying something.
- By using these stock expressions, one is excusing oneself from doing any actual thinking. The true danger in these usages lies in that they often distort and change original ideas to fit them into an established rhetorical mold.
- Pompous language only serves to obscure meaning, and thus it is necessary to move towards simpler usages of language while being mindful of the exact meaning of the words.
I'm not sure if I agree totally on point number 3, or if it just applies to the English language. I cannot think of a time when the Spanish language was more beautiful than the Siglo de Oro, where language was used in the most complex ways imaginable. Read any poem by Góngora and, at first, you'll be both fascinated and mystified. Yet, those writers were able to use the words in those ways because they knew the exact meanings of those words.
There is no doubt that this misuse of language is a huge problem nowadays (corporate speak, anyone? hell, you don't have to go any further than the P&CE forums), and that some people deliberately misconstrue the language to sound like they are saying something without adding anything to the conversation.
Any thoughts on this?