Language barriers

In his essay ‘Politics and the English Language’ (1946), George Orwell laments the corruption of the English language in postwar society. Everywhere he finds pompous phrases designed to sound weighty (‘render inoperative’, meaning ‘break’); Latin- or Greek-based words where simpler words will do (‘ameliorate’ for ‘improve’, ‘clandestine’ for ‘secret’); words which have lost their meaning (‘fascism’, meaning ‘something not desirable’); padding to give an impression of depth (‘this is a consideration which we should do well to bear in mind’); clichés (‘ring the changes on’, ‘play into the hands of’, ‘toe the line’, ‘explore every avenue’). Words that give him particular grief include ‘phenomenon’, ‘element’, ‘objective’, ‘categorical’, ‘virtual’, ‘basic’, ‘primary’, ‘promote’, ‘constitute’, ‘exhibit’, ‘exploit’, ‘utilise’.

Orwell continues, ‘A speaker who uses that kind of phraseology has gone some distance to turning himself into a machine. The appropriate noises are coming out of his larynx, but his brain is not involved as it would be if he were choosing his words for himself.’