1984 by George Orwell, Part 1: Crash Course Literature 401 - YouTube (2)

This foreshadows that language will become increasingly oppressive…

Which, of course, is bad news for Winston and his peers.

But there is some good news for the rest of humanity.

Because you will notice that the appendix is written in Standard English.

As many readers (including Thomas Pynchon and Margaret Atwood) have pointed out, this

suggests that free thought and its expression will ultimately prevail, and that language

will once again be rich and complex and free.

Thanks Thought Bubble.

So how do we get back to free language?

Well I'm a writer, and as such I'm almost professionally obligated to believe in the

power of language--and next week we'll go into more detail about the complicated relationship

between thoughts and language, but I think it's worth mentioning now that while we

don't think entirely in words, language does help give form and expression to complex

ideas within us.

I mean, that's part of what books attempt to do, but it's also something we're all

doing all day, because we think in language.

It's one of the primary ways we communicate our feelings and experiences to other people,

but it's also one of the primary ways we communicate that stuff within us.

And I think in 1984 Orwell argues that the restriction of language is ultimately a form

of restricting thought itself.

It's encouraging that Newspeak may ultimately fail, but it does make me wonder: what thoughts

can't I think because of the language that I've inherited?

Next time we'll also address a question that should be on your mind (since you're

watching this video on something very like a telescreen, possibly while in a government-funded

school where the government is deciding at least in part what you learn about):

What can 1984 teach us about our current political context and our relationship to what many

have called “surveillance” society?

And in a world where so many of us volunteer so much of ourselves to the public sphere,

is there value in private life?

Spoiler alert: I think so.

But we'll talk more about that next week.

Thanks for watching.

I'll see you then.