Politics and the English Language: Response

This was a great reading from one of my favorite authors, and I agree with all of Orwell’s points. I also think the sort of writing that Orwell deplored in the 1940’s is, in many ways, more prevalent today--especially in the realms of academia and politics. Often it seems like words are chosen not to express meaning, but to conceal it, which is opposite to the way things should be.

As we move forward with our argument papers, I think it’s important that we remember that our purpose in writing them is to persuade others of our point of view, and that it’s impossible to do that if you’re afraid of your meaning yourself. Good writing clearly communicates the writer’s thoughts--it doesn’t conceal them. Particularly in academia I think the tendency is to try and communicate how intelligent you are by using complicated words and flowery metaphors, rather than express meaning.

This is exactly why many people in our current society choose to remain uneducated about critical issues--it’s just easier to remain ignorant about the issues than it is to try and decipher some professor or politician’s “psychobabble”. If all writers approached their subjects clearly, more people would be interested in the issues.

I also related this reading to one of my goals for this class, which is to learn to write more clearly and achieve the quality in my writing that Orwell saw lacking in much of the writing of his time. The “four questions” that Orwell suggested every writer ask before penning a sentence will be an especially useful tool as I continue to write for this class and in future classes--if I can keep a clear vision of why I am writing the argument paper (or any other paper) and approach my writing in terms of how well it accomplishes that objective, then my writing will improve, because I will be writing critically as well as thinking critically.