The Decay of English Prose
Nicole Van Drunen 100093500
It is made clear in George Orwell’s “Politics and the English Language” that the English language is being practiced in a poor manner. Most suppose there is nothing they can to do to change this and there, lies a belief that language changes naturally rather then it be altered and used to fulfill ones own meanings.
The decline of the English language is strongly influenced by poor political and economic use. Once the language is presented in a poor manner, it is understood in a poor manner and it is then repeated and habituated in a poor manner. This cycle can be reversible. Poor language can be avoided provided one is willing to go out of their way to do so. Removing any poor language habits allows one to think clearer, and the ability to think clearly allows for change.
Unclear meaning and lack of skill in writing is typical in modern English prose. Prose has become less meaningful and people put less thought into it because they resort to reusing phrases that they have already heard. Some avoidable common mistakes in prose, created by George Orwell, are explained below.
1. The repeatable and prefabricated use of metaphors causes people to misunderstand their meaning, mix the metaphor’s up or twists them, as Orwell states, “out of their original meaning” (Orwell 3).
2. Rather than using just one simple verb, operators are added to form the verb into a phrase. Statements formed using operators lack originality but give the writer a false appearance of intellect.
3. Most pretentious dictions are words used to make simple statements seem fair to bias opinions. These words are commonly used to justify ignoble actions involved in politics or war. The use of pretentious diction usually results in messy writing with an unclear meaning.
4. Meaningless words are left for the reader’s interpretation. By leaving the reader to create their own private meanings of words, meaningless words are open to lots of interpretation and commonly abused in a “consciously dishonest way” (Orwell 4) with “intent to deceive” (Orwell 4) especially in politics.
With such common errors, modern prose is moving away from concreteness. It does not involve the sorting and choosing of words to formulate clear meaning. It involves the repetitive use of stringing together words and phrases that have been previously used by others in order to easily create writing, without having to really think. In the process of saving on “mental effort” (Orwell 5), modern prose is left very vague, and meaningless.
The obligation to improve English prose is up to the writer. Thorough writers will ask themselves several questions with each sentence they write. By asking these questions, a writer prevents the many “ready-made phrases” (Orwell 6) to be the content of their writing.
Orwell claims that bad writing is very common in politics. Most political speeches are a series of ready-made repeated phrases spoken to the public over and over again. The political language also consists of many indirect words and phrases that make for an unclear message. This is extremely purposeful in politics when defending something that is not generally justifiable.
When politicians, and any one else, take negative thoughts and turn them into deceptive language, then in return, the deceptive language will be turned into thought and thus one can corrupt the other and vise versa. The only way to prevent the corruption is to always be aware of the many “ready-made phrases” (Orwell 6). In using this process the English language has seen foolish phrases fade away over time usually through conscious minority’s or vocal journalists attempting to make “pretentiousness unfashionable” (Orwell 8).
It is most important, when choosing words in the English language, that they are chosen based on their meaning. One must make a conscious effort to have precise meaning to their words, and truly understand their meanings so that one can choose, rather than accept the words and phrases in which they are expressing.
Language is a way in which we are able to express thought. We need to be able to recognize the poor quality of language used in politics today and the ways in which we can make improvements to this decay. The political world is “designed to make lies sound truthful” (Orwell 9). The most any one person can do is notice and change their own bad language habits and in doing so, influence others behavior through the use of proper language.
Work Cited
Orwell, George. "Politics and the English Language." Standford MLA Application Critical Writing Piece (2005-2006): 1-9. 9 Oct 2010.
The Strength of Faith
Nicole Van Drunen 100093500
The word “Faith” stands alone at the top of the page as the e-poem “Faith” by Robert Kendall begins to unravel. It is presented in a Bible typeface suggesting a correlation to the significance of faith in Christianity. The word “logic” appears and rains down bouncing off the word “Faith,” causing no impact upon the word at all. Logic is unable to alter faith. Mystical, organ music plays, reinforcing the connection of faith to Christianity, and with it more words begin to swarm in to reveal a question: can faith help us to understand life? It is further revealed that if one is willing to put logic aside and embrace faith, they may find the answer.
It is hard to make the mental jump from logic to faith. One tries to hold on to this logic but soon find they need to take that jump in order to be freed from logic, and discover their true faith. Without taking this step towards faith, one will remain caught up in their logic and nothing will change. Thinking within logic will only get you so far. At some point, it is important to put logic aside and embrace the feeling of faith for one may find that, in life, faith is stronger than logic and is what matters most in life. Faith will always be present, as it is throughout the poem, and to the faithful person (i.e. Christian), nothing else matters, as is illustrated when all the words come crashing down and faith is left standing alone.