newspeak

See also: Newspeak

English

WOTD – 8 June 2016

Etymology

From Newspeak, a word coined by George Orwell. Equivalent to new +‎ speak.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈn(j)uːspiːk/

• Audio (General Australian):

  (file)

Noun

newspeak (usually uncountable, plural newspeaks)

1. Use of ambiguous, misleading, or euphemistic words in order to deceive the listener, especially by politicians and officials.

   Antonym: oldspeak

   • 1984, Jonathon Green, “Introduction”, in Newspeak: A Dictionary of Jargon, London: Routledge & Kegal Paul plc, ISBN 978-0-7100-9685-2; republished Abingdon, Oxon.; New York, N.Y.: Routledge, 2014, ISBN 978-0-415-73271-0, page ix:

     Yet no-one would deny that a form of ‘newspeak’, however altered, is all too prevalent. Where [George] Orwell’s society was governed by the stick, we are offered the carrot. The truncation of the language on ‘Airstrip One’ was a logical response to the harsh social engineering that engendered it. The soothing, delusory world of ‘equality’, of much-touted ‘democracy’, has created a ‘newspeak’ all its own. Rather than shorten the language it is infinitely broadened; instead of curt monosyllables, there are mellifluous, calming phrases, designed to allay suspicions, modify facts and divert one’s attention from difficulties.

   • 1995, Edward Możejko, “Between Symbolist Decline and the Rise of Newspeak: Mapping the Dynamics of the Russian Literary Avant-Garde”, in Christian Berg, Frank Durieux, Geert Lernout, editors, The Turn of the Century: Modernism and Modernity in Literature and the Arts/Le tournant du siècle : Le modernisme et la modernité dans la littérature et les arts (European Cultures; 3), Berlin, New York, N.Y.: Walter de Gruyter, →ISBN, page 327:

     [T]he last stage in the evolution of the Russian literary avant-garde and its final demise was marked by its sharp and growing conflict with the rise of newspeak. The concept of newspeak has been with us now for quite some time. However, it only recently began to be treated as an exponent of a certain cultural vision advanced by sheer and impudent political power. At the same time, it is more than that. Newspeak can be defined as discourse, proper or peculiar to the totalitarian state and transmitted through the manipulative use of language to all sectors and institutions of the state.

   • 2002, Slava Gerovitch, “The Cold War in Code Words: The Newspeak of Soviet Science”, in From Newspeak to Cyberspeak: A History of Soviet Cybernetics, Cambridge, Mass., London: MIT Press, →ISBN, page 47:

     […] Soviet ideology itself may be more productively viewed as the result of conscious attempts to explicate and rationalize assorted discursive strategies, or mechanisms, of newspeak, in much the same way as grammatical rules are invented to describe diverse linguistic practices.

Translations

use of ambiguous words to deceive listeners

• Albanian: please add this translation if you can
• Arabic: please add this translation if you can
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 新話／新话 (zh) (xīnhuà)

• Czech: newspeak (cs) m, novořeč f
• Dutch: Nieuwspraak f
• Finnish: uuskieli (fi)
• French: novlangue (fr) f
• German: Neusprech (de) n
• Hebrew: שִׂיחָדָשׁ (he) m (siẖádash)
• Italian: neolingua f
• Macedonian: новоговор m (novogovor)
• Polish: nowomowa (pl) f
• Portuguese: novilíngua f
• Russian: новоя́з (ru) m (novojáz)
• Serbo-Croatian: novogovor m
• Spanish: neolengua f
• Swedish: nyspråk (sv) n
• Thai: please add this translation if you can
• Ukrainian: please add this translation if you can
• Vietnamese: please add this translation if you can

References

• “newspeak”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.

Czech

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from English newspeak.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [ˈɲuːspiːk]
• Hyphenation: new‧speak

Noun

newspeak m inan

1. newspeak [since 20th c.]

   Synonym: novořeč

   • 2012, Vojtěch Bednář, Krizová komunikace s médii‎^[1], Praha: Grada Publishing, page 70:

     V politice je newspeak nutností, součástí strategie vyjednávání, a také určitým byť pokleslým symbolem její kultury.

     In politics newspeak is a necessity, a part of the negotiation strategy, and also a sort of ignoble symbol of its culture.

Declension

Declension of newspeak (velar masculine inanimate)

	singular	plural
nominative	newspeak	newspeaky
genitive	newspeaku	newspeaků
dative	newspeaku	newspeakům
accusative	newspeak	newspeaky
vocative	newspeaku	newspeaky
locative	newspeaku	newspeacích
instrumental	newspeakem	newspeaky

Derived terms

• newspeakový