Politics and the English language

It’s now under a month till the AP Test, so it’s never too early to take some advice that has stood the test of time in politics…and political science classes.

(From George Orwell: “Politics and the English Language,” first published: Horizon, GB, London. April 1946)

In the essay, Orwell wrote:"[The English language]... becomes ugly and inaccurate because our thoughts are foolish... the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts... Modern English, especially written English, is full of bad habits which spread by imitation and which can be avoided if one is willing to take the necessary trouble. If one gets rid of these habits one can think more clearly... so that the fight against bad English is not frivolous and is not the exclusive concern of professional writers..."

In arguing against "staleness of imagery" and "lack of precision," Orwell warns writers to avoid

• "Dying Metaphors" (instead we should use new and vital comparisons)
• "Verbal False Limbs" (he suggests simple, direct, active verbs)
• "Pretentious Diction" ("Um, George," I want to ask, "Isn't a phrase like 'verbal false limbs' a bit pretentious?")
• "Meaningless Words" (like "romantic, plastic, values, human, dead, sentimental, natural, vitality...")

In the essay, Orwell offers these rules:

1. Never use a metaphor, simile or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.
2. Never use a long word where a short one will do.
3. If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
4. Never use the passive where you can use the active.
5. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
6. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous ("Um, George, I know what you mean by 'barbarous,' but what was what you said about 'meaningless words?'")

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Ken Wedding, after reading exams for a dozen years, has some more suggestions to offer exam writers:

• make sure they're clear about cause and effect relationships in their answers. The most common logical error I read in exams was the confusion of causal relationships. It was more common that factual errors.
• avoid pronouns, even if that makes their answers sound "clunky." If students want an exam reader to know what they, as test takers mean, students don't want to leave any doubt about what "it" or "they" or "her" refers to. People sitting for exams are not writing literature; instead students should be trying to demonstrate what they know and how well they can think about what they know. (If students proofread an answer, they can add arrows to any vague pronouns to indicate antecedents. Exam readers will read the arrows.)
• be explicit about points they want to make. That will make the answer more succinct and more likely to be understood. Vaguely explaining poor reasoning doesn't make the reasoning any better. Long, rambling explanations are most often signals that writers don't know what to say.
• follow Orwell's rules
• practice, practice, practice