Abstract

The Power of Language in Orwell’s Animal Farm: An Analysis of Speech Acts

Jiaxin Lyu

Volume: 15 Issue: 3 2025

Abstract:

This study aims to pragmatically analyze the power of language and its impact on people, with a focus on George Orwell’s British novel Animal Farm. This research adopts Austin and Searle’s speech act theory as its theoretical framework to examine how different types of speech acts function in the language manipulation. Four key extracts are selected in chronological order from the novel and subjected to contextual and pragmatic analysis. The findings indicate that the performative function of language can imperceptibly influence individuals’ minds and reshape social dynamics. Based on Searle’s classification of illocutionary acts, the research also finds that the pigs’ manipulation of language relies mainly on representatives, which construct ideology, and directives, which control behavior, with less dependence on commissive and expressive.

DOI: http://doi.org/10.37648/ijrssh.v15i03.001

Back Download

References

• Archer, D., & Grundy, P. (2011). The pragmatics reader. (No Title).
• Austin, J. L. (1975). How to do things with words. Harvard University Press.
• Crick, B. R. (1980). George Orwell: A life. (No Title).
• Dwan, D. (2012). Orwell’s paradox: Equality in animal farm. Elh, 79(3), 655–683.
• Elaref, A. I. A. (2022). Power’s Manipulation of the Minds and Language’s Creation of Knowledge: Foucault’s Power/Knowledge as Depicted in George Orwell’s Animal Farm. ممممممممم مممم مممم, 31(54), 187–210
• Elbarbary, S. (1992). Language as Theme in Animal farm. International Fiction Review.
• Grice, H. P. (1975). Logic and conversation. Syntax and Semantics, 3, 43–58.
• Harris, S. (1995). Pragmatics and power. Journal of Pragmatics, 23(2), 117–135.
• Kirschner, P. (2004). The dual purpose of Animal Farm. The Review of English Studies, 55(222), 759–786.
• Li, Qiao. (2013). Co-existing Relationship of Power and Language: Critical Discourse Analysis of Squealer in Animal Farm from Perspective of Power Discourse. Foreign Language and Literature, 4(007).
• Min, Yang. (2011). Penetrating the Transparency of Language: An Interpretation of the Relationships between Language and Power in Animal Farm. Foreign Literature Studies, 33(6), 153–158.
• Orwell, G. (2013). Animal Farm. Penguin Books.
• Risdianto, F., Malihah, N., & Guritno, A. (2019). The problem of Presupposition in George Orwell’s Novella Animal Farm. Journal of Pragmatics Research, 1(1), 1–12.
• Rodden, J. (2007). The cambridge companion to george orwell. Cambridge University Press.
• Rodden, J. (2008). How do stories convince us? Notes towards a rhetoric of narrative. College Literature, 148–173.
• Sadock, J. (2006). Speech acts. The Handbook of Pragmatics, 53–73.
• Searle, J. R. (1969). Speech acts: An essay in the philosophy of language. Cambridge university press.
• Senn, S. (2015). All propaganda is dangerous, but some are more dangerous than others: George Orwell and the use of literature as propaganda. Journal of Strategic Security, 8(3), 149–161.
• Turkey, T., & Al-Hilu, M. (2020). The power of language in Orwell’s novel: Animal Farm a pragmatic study. International Journal of Research in Social Sciences and Humanities, 10(02), 225–233.
• Yule, G. (2022). The study of language. Cambridge University Press.