Thinking Activity : 1984

Thinking Activity :1984

Nineteen Eighty-four, also published as 1984, novel by English author George Orwell published in 1949 as a warning against totalitarianism. The chilling dystopia made a deep impression on readers, and his ideas entered mainstream culture in a way achieved by very few books. The book’s title and many of its concepts, such as Big Brother and the Thought Police, are instantly recognized and understood, often as bywords for modern social and political abuses.

What is Dystopian Fiction?

From movies to novels to video games, dystopian fiction is consistently one of the hottest genres in entertainment. But given its broad scope and variety of forms, the dystopian genre can sometimes be hard to categorize

First, let’s define Utopia and Dystopia

A Utopia is considered an ideally perfect place, especially in its social, political, and moral aspects. The idea of it is derived from a 1516 book by Sir Thomas More that describes an imaginary ideal society free of poverty and suffering.

Dystopian Fiction :

Dystopia is the opposite of utopia: a state in which the conditions of human life are extremely bad as from deprivation or oppression or terror (or all three). A dystopian society is characterized by human misery in the form of squalor, oppression, disease, overcrowding, environmental destruction, or war. Below is an example of a real dystopia in present-day Syria.

DYSTOPIAN FICTION DEFINITION :

The dystopian genre imagines worlds or societies where life is extremely bad because of deprivation or oppression or terror, and human society is characterized by human misery, such as squalor, oppression, disease, overcrowding, environmental destruction, or war.

Characteristics of Dystopian Fiction :

Corporate

Religious/Philosophical

Technological

Bureaucratic

Reproductive

Totalitarianism — defined as total social control over a given population through techniques such as thought police and surveillance — is also a feature of dystopian fiction. It figures prominently in famous dystopian novels such as George Orwell’s 1984, which we investigate further below.

 '1984' dystopian fiction:

In 1949, British author and essayist George Orwell wrote of a future where a global despotic power controlled the people of Oceania with surveillance and propaganda. This was "1984.It depicted a dark future where technology exists in the public realm only as a tool for the elite to control society.But while the book is a work of dystopian fiction, some of the technological innovations that it predicted have come true in the 70 years since it was published.

In 1984, characters live in fear of wars, government surveillance, and political oppression of free speech. The London of the novel is dirty and crumbling, with food shortages, exploding bombs, and miserable citizens. The government is an all-powerful force of oppression and control, and crushes the characters’ identities and dreams. This dystopian vision of the future, written thirty-five years before the year the novel is set, suggests that man’s inherent nature is corrupt and repressive. Orwell wrote the book in the aftermath of World War II and the rise of fascism in Germany and the Soviet Union, and paints a pessimistic picture of society’s ability to avoid further global disasters.

2) your learning about the novel from online screening of the film.

The novel 1984 by George Orwell is one of the interesting novel and we also did a screening of this novel. Screening helps us to understand lots of things.In this work screening helps to understand such a situation of dystopian society. How people were brainwashed and how everyone obeyed particular parties it’s clear to mind. It throws light on so many things. Whatever we see is more memorable than we watch.

3) What according to you is the central theme of this novel?

According to me Totalitarianism is one of the major themes of the novel, 1984. It presents the type of government where even the head of the government is unknown to the public. This theme serves as a warning to the people because such regime unleashes propaganda to make people believe in the lies presented by the government. Throughout the novel, there is no proof of Big Brother’s existence in Oceania. The Party exercises complete control not only on the sexual lives of their citizens such as Julia’s and Winston Smith but also on their thoughts, feelings and even writing a diary. The overall monitoring and surveillance of the people through telescreens and subversion of history through the Ministry of Truth are some of the common casualties of such regimes. The third casualty of the totalitarianism is the truth through language. This happens in the shape of mottos such as “War is Peace.”

4) What do you understand about the term 'Orwellian'?

The term was named after British author Eric Blair known by his pen name George Orwell. Because his most famous work, the novel "1984," depicts an oppressive society under a totalitarian government, "Orwellian" is often used simply to mean authoritarian. But using the term in this way not only fails to fully convey Orwell's message, it actually risks doing precisely what he tried to warn against.n his essay, "Politics and the English Language," he described techniques like using pretentious words to project authority, or making atrocities sound acceptable by burying them in euphemisms and convoluted sentence structures. But even more mundane abuses of language can affect the way we think about things. The words you see and hear in everyday advertising have been crafted to appeal to you and affect your behavior, as have the soundbites and talking points of political campaigns which rarely present the most nuanced perspective on the issues. And the way that we use ready-made phrases and responses gleaned from media reports or copied from the Internet makes it easy to get away with not thinking too deeply or questioning your assumptions.

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