DISCURSIVE DYSTOPIAS: LANGUAGE, POWER, AND IDEOLOGY IN ORWELL, ATWOOD, AND EVANS

Diana Alexandra Avram (Șandru)

1 Decembrie 1918 University of Alba Iulia

Abstract

This article examines language as a mechanism of ideological control in George Orwell’s 1984, Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, and Vyvyan Evans’ The Babel Apocalypse. Using a semantic-pragmatic framework, it explores how linguistic features, such as lexical innovation, naming conventions, ritualised speech acts, and silences, function as instruments of power, identity formation, and resistance within these dystopian societies. Through comparative analysis, the study identifies common strategies including vocabulary reduction, semantic narrowing, symbolic re-signification, and algorithmically mediated communication. These techniques not only uphold authoritarian regimes but also shape subjectivity by limiting what can be thought, said, or expressed.

Drawing on critical discourse analysis, speech act theory, and Foucauldian concepts of power/knowledge, the article reveals how language operates as an active site of control, coercion, and subversion. Despite reflecting distinct ideological and technological contexts, the novels converge in portraying language as paramount to sustaining and occasionally unravelling authoritarian power. Finally, the article advocates for integrative approaches that combine close textual analysis with corpus-based methods, offering new insights into the evolving relationship between fiction, discourse, and political reality.

Keywords: Dystopian discourse; Semantic-pragmatic analysis; Language and ideology; Linguistic control; Orwell, Atwood, Evans.

References

Primary sources

Atwood, M. (1996). The Handmaid’s Tale. Vintage.

Evans, V. (2023). The Babel Apocalypse. Nephilim Publishing.

Orwell, G. (2000). 1984. Penguin Books.

Secondary sources

Austin, J. L. (1962). How to do things with words. Harvard University Press.

Bakhtin, M. (1981). Discourse in the Novel (M. Holquist, & C. Emerson, Trans.). In M. Holquist (Ed.), The Dialogic Imagination (pp. 259-422). University of Texas Press.

Butler, J. (1990). Gender trouble: Feminism and the subversion of identity. Routledge Classics.

Butler, J. (1997). Excitable speech: A politics of the performative. Routledge.

Fairclough, N. (1989). Language and power. Longman.

Fairclough, N. (2010). Critical discourse analysis: The critical study of language (2nd ed.). Pearson Education.

Fairclough, N. (2013). Critical discourse analysis: The critical study of language (3rd ed.). Routledge.

Foucault, M. (1980). Power/knowledge: Selected interviews and other writings, 1972–1977 (C. Gordon, Ed. & Trans.; L. Marshall, J. Meeham, & K. Soper, Trans.). Pantheon Books.

Fowler, R., Hodge, B., Kress, G., & Trew, T. (1979). Language and Control. Routledge and Kegan Paul.

Fowler, R. (1995). The Language of George Orwell. Macmillan.

Grice, H. P. (1975). Logic and conversation. In P. Cole & J. L. Morgan (Eds.), Syntax and semantics: Vol. 3. Speech acts (pp. 41–58). Academic Press.

Kress, G. R., & Hodge, R. (1979). Language as ideology. Routledge & Kegan Paul.

Millward, J. (2006). Dystopian Wor(l)ds: Language Within and Beyond Experience (Unpublished PhD Thesis). University of Sheffield.

Searle, J. R. (1969). Speech acts: An essay in the philosophy of language. Cambridge University Press.

Searle, J. R. (1979). Expression and Meaning: Studies in the Theory of Speech Acts. Cambridge University Press.

Whorf, B. L. (1956). Language, thought, and reality: Selected writings of Benjamin Lee Whorf. J. B. Carroll (Ed.). MIT Press.

How to cite this article: Avram (Șandru), D. A. (2024). Discursive dystopias: Language, power, and ideology in Orwell, Atwood, and Evans. Journal of Linguistic and Intercultural Education – JoLIE, 17(3), 7–22. https://doi.org/10.29302/jolie.2024.17.3.1

For details on subscription, go to: http://jolie.uab.ro/index.php?pagina=-&id=19&l=en