1. The document discusses key points from George Orwell's essay "Politics and the English Language" including his criticisms of dying metaphors, operators/verbal false limbs, pretentious diction, and meaningless words that have led to the decline of clear written English. 2. Orwell argues that images are important for conveying meaning but modern translations and writings often lack vivid imagery. 3. The most important topic for Orwell is precise, truthful writing in clear prose with sufficient imagery for understanding rather than vagueness and lack of precision.

1. 10/13/21, 6:54 AM Topic: Week Three Discussion A
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Yesterday
1. The main purpose of the essay is to explain how written
English is filled with bad habits,
which are copied by other writers. The historical impetus is
writings that contained vague
descriptions that did not express the truth or inadvertently say
something else. Orwell indicates
that "bad usage" leads to "avoidable ugliness", the staleness of
imagery, and lack of precision.
2. Images are used in writing to show the writer's intended
meaning. Orwell uses images in his
essay to strengthen the illustration of his point about choosing
proper English expressions.
3. The "modern translation" of Ecclesiastes contains many
syllables but does give a concrete
illustration as the original. There weren't any vivid images or
phrases. The swift race under the
sun, the battle to the strong, or the riches and favor to men of
understanding and skill were all

2. left out.
4. Orwell is interested in prose-style writing since it usually
shares the intended meaning of
what the writer is trying to express. Prose style to Orwell meant
concrete and clear writing
instead of vagueness and tacked together phrases.
5. The four main criticisms are dying metaphors, operators or
verbal false limbs, pretentious
diction, and meaningless words. Dying metaphors save writers
the time of coming up with their
own phrases which leads to misuse. Operators or verbal false
limbs save the hassle of picking
out appropriate verbs and nouns but fills sentences with extra
syllables giving sentences a
symmetrical appearance. Pretentious diction use words like
element, objective, and
categorical to dress up a simple statement. Meaningless words
like romantic, sentimental, and
vitality are used in art and literary criticism but do not point to
any discoverable object, leaving
it open to individual interpretation. Each one of these examples
was aimed directly to prove
Orwell's point of politics in the English language and habitual
misuse.
6. The topic of most importance to Orwell is writing that is
precise and truthfully written in
prose style with enough imagery for understanding. Orwell
states in his criticism of five
passages the avoidable ugliness in the qualities of staleness in
imagery and lack of precision
were the most common of them all. The writer had a meaning
and did not express it, said
something else. Certain topics were not concrete and became

3. abstract. Phrases were tacked
together and prosed construction was avoided.
7. The use of the word 'democracy' was problematic in Orwell's
time since there isn't a clear
use of the word. Due to it being used in a dishonest way
amongst countries under another's
rule, acts of war on another. Democracy will always be a
problem.
8. At this time I do not recall any points that overlap with
Orwell.
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10/13/21, 6:54 AM Topic: Week Three Discussion A
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pics/1556637?module_item_id=8893686 5/6
(https:// Summer Cooper
(https://online.valenciacollege.edu/courses/123618/users/42657
0)
Yesterday
1. The main purpose of George Orwell’s “Politics and the
English language” is how the
decline of the English language is because people are trying to
make it unnecessarily
complicated with meaningless words.

4. 2. According to Orwell, images are used to help get the point
across that the words cannot.
Orwell states in his ‘dying metaphor’ paragraph “A newly
invented metaphor assists
thought by evoking a visual image”.
3. George Orwell finds the modern translation wrong because it
has become vaguer and
loses the imagery provided in the original verse in Ecclesiastes.
Orwell states “The second
contains not a single fresh, arresting phrase”
4. Orwell is particularly interested in the prose style because
with this style he is able to tell
about the author and it is more clear, direct, and precise.
5. The four main criticisms Orwell has towards modern writing
are Dying Metaphors,
Operators or Verbal False Limbs, Pretentious Diction, and
Meaningless Words. For Dying
Metaphors Orwell states that “metaphor assists thought by
evoking a visual image,” But,
when overused it becomes a dying metaphor losing its impact
over time.
For Operators or Verbal False Limbs, Orwell thinks that writers
are adding irrelevant nouns
and syllables to seem better. But, he believes it should just be
more simple. For, Pretentious
Diction Orwell believes that extending words to be longer is
unnecessary. Which only makes
the writing vague. As for, Meaningless Words Orwell thinks
that the meaning of one’s writing
becomes meaningless when meaningless words are used.

5. 6. At the end of the day, the most important thing to Orwell is
to fix these habits in writing that
he himself criticizes. Such as the Meaningless Words or the
Dying Metaphors.
7. The problematic use of the word “democracy” is that it
doesn’t have an actual definition
and can be used to fit anyone’s personal definition for it.
Nowadays it can be used by
politicians that ideals are not necessarily democratic but, will
convince people that is what they
are going for.
8. Some points made by Orwell overlap with what we’ve done
in class. For example, we’ve
done assignments where we’ve had to do write in a simple
manner and in comparison one’s
where we had to be more complex with our explanations.
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