Theme Of Propaganda In George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four

For hundreds of years, human beings have been fascinated with how their own minds worked, and have even built a science around the concept: psychology. But for as long as humans have been interested in discovering how the mind words, there has also been those interested in exploring ways to control it. In his political science fiction novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell describes the methods used by the Party, the reigning political power in the nation of Oceania. The Party controls every thought of the citizens of the country it governs, and cruelly and severely punishes those who do not comply. In his novel, Orwell explores the inner depths of the human mind and comments on the suggestibility, impressionability and malleability of …show more content…
Hitler and the Nazis used it in World War II, both the Americans and the Soviets used it in the Cold War, and it is still being used today to get young adults to join the military. It is also used by the Party of Oceania to rally support for Big Brother and to influence the opinions of the citizens. “The persuasive power of every medium, technique and genre of communication is exploited to its maximum potential and single-mindedly put to work” (Yeo). Slogans, sayings and catchphrases have been a key aspect propagandists have utilized to influence the minds of those the propaganda is aimed at, and the Party is no different. The Party used three key slogans that they advertise all over Oceania. These slogans are: “WAR IS PEACE” (Orwell 6), “FREEDOM IS SLAVERY” (Orwell 6), and “IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH” (Orwell 6). These slogans are incredibly contradictory in nature, and at first glance make no sense at all. They are however explained in chapter three of Emmanuel Goldstein’s book, THE THEORY AND PRACTICE OF OLIGARCHICAL COLLECTIVISM, which is revealed later on in the novel to have actually been written by the O’Brien and Thought Police. The book explains how, even though the slogans are contradictory and nonsensical at first, they actually can be proven to be logically true. This is another excellent example of the Party manipulating the minds of the citizens, telling them that …show more content…
The Party controls the thoughts, opinions and actions of the citizens of Oceania by controlling every outside influence and stimuli they come into contact with. The Party controls the citizens through the implementation of the artificially constructed language Newspeak, which controls the way the people can form thoughts and ideas by limiting their vocabulary to only words approved by the Party. Technology is also used to manipulate the citizens. For example, the telescreens that are housed in every building, home and other structures that allow the Party to see and hear everything the person standing in front of it does or says. The Ministry of Love also uses advanced technology to torture its captives and convert them back to the Party’s mandates. Propaganda is also a technique employed by the Party to control its citizens, using contradictory slogans that install the thought in the people that the Party knows what is best for them, and also using the Junior Spies program to use people’s own children to catch them doing anything illegal. It is fairly obvious to readers that Orwell has proposed a reality that, while eccentric and far fetched, with hard work and a few bad decisions, would still entirely possible in today’s day and age. People today can only hope and pray that, while