newspeak

[ noo-speek, nyoo- ]

noun

1. (sometimes initial capital letter) an official or semiofficial style of writing or saying one thing in the guise of its opposite, especially in order to serve a political or ideological cause while pretending to be objective, as in referring to “increased taxation” as “revenue enhancement.”

newspeak

/ ˈnjuːˌspiːk /

noun

1. the language of bureaucrats and politicians, regarded as deliberately ambiguous and misleading

Word History and Origins

Origin of newspeak¹

new + speak, coined by George Orwell in his novel 1984 (1949)

Word History and Origins

Origin of newspeak¹

C20: from 1984, a novel by George Orwell

Example Sentences

Pushkin called the bill “political rubbish” and compared it to the book “1984,” George Orwell’s classic chilling tale of a society in which facts are distorted and suppressed in a cloud of “newspeak.”

From Seattle Times

Such language is right-wing newspeak for a second Civil War.

From Salon

Fox News' slogans and catch-phrases such as "Fair & Balanced", "Real News. Real Honest Opinion", and "We Report. You Decide" are Orwellian newspeak; Fox News is doing exactly the opposite.

From Salon

Their Orwellian newspeak version of "freedom, liberty and individual rights" just means that people are free as long as they do what Republicans want.

From Salon

“Food processor” sounds like newspeak concocted by a sinister culinary regime to reassure the international community.

From Washington Post

Related Words

• argot
• idiom
• lingo
• parlance
• patois
• slang
• vernacular
• vocabulary