...‘Controlling the minds of the people translates to the control of the body’ how far do you agree? Totalitarianism is a common theme ground between ‘The Colour Purple’ and ‘1984’ where both protagonists seem to be ‘suspended’ and ‘were lost in a period that offered no hope of progress’ George Orwell’s ‘1984’ and Alice Walker’s ‘The Color Purple’ have a society where there is complete control and oppression, which eventually translates to the control of the body, we are presented with the party members and the black women protagonists being the proletariat of society, and never truly being free because ‘As long as the mind is enslaved, the body can never be free’ however, we are presented objects and behaviour that can be described as liberating,...
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...The novel 1984, which was published in 1949 by George Orwell, is very significant to humans and society. In its own particular day, it was viewed as a 'visionary' and 'modern' novel, which placed how the world would be in years to come. Undoubtedly, we can state that a considerable lot of Orwell's thoughts, specifically as to totalitarianism in this work, were demonstrated genuine social orders, governments, did ventures to reduce mainstream opportunity/s and nationals' voices and challenges, and frameworks of watchfulness rose that help one to remember 'The government' viewing. Indeed, even today, in the 21st century, more than 60 years after the novel's distribution, there are various ways that it is as yet applicable; whereby we can perceive...
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...Modern Totalitarianism. In the 1940s through the 1960s, the world lived in a time of war. In September 1939 World War II broke out , and was followed by the Cold War of 1947 that lasted up until 1991. The historic wars of these times influenced literature and the writers of the time, as they shaped their novels and books around these events. Writers such as George Orwell and Kurt Vonnegut created novels of dystopian societies to alert nations that communism was not as great as it sounded. British writer George Orwell wrote the novel 1984 published by Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc. in 1949. 1984 is a political novel written with the purpose of warning readers in the West of the dangers of totalitarian government. In 1949, the Cold War had not yet escalated, and many Americans supported communism as possible political systems for the west. Therefore, Orwell wrote his novel in order to expose the cruelty and oppression of communist countries. In his dystopian nation, Orwell gave a sneak peak of what a country could become if the people gave all the power to the government. In 1984, Orwell portrays the perfect totalitarian society in which the government monitors and controls every aspect of human life to the extent that having a disloyal thought is against the law. They do so with the use of technology such as tele screens and microphones across the city which allowed the government to monitor all the citizens almost all of the times. In order to keep the citizens of London...
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...1984 is a dystopian novel written by George Orwell and it represents a perfect totalitarian society. The plot takes place in Airstrip One, a part of the superstate Oceania in a world of perpetual war, oppressive government with absolute power, led by the so called Big Brother, a leader that is the patron of the English socialism, i.e. Ingsoc and worshiped by the Party members. The novel is filled with motifs from the Soviet Union and wartime life in Great Britain, as it represents a warning about the dangers of communism as a totalitarian regime. Moreover, Orwell was also particularly concerned by the role of technology that was increasingly developing in enabling governments to monitor and control their citizens. Today, around 66 years after the novel is published, the war has long ended, the Soviet Union fell apart and democracy prevailed over communism, at least in some parts of the world. Still, there are some areas where the plot of this novel is not purely fiction, it’s similar to reality. An example of such country is North Korea. North Korea is a small country in East Asia, led by a dictator called Kim Jong-un who inherited the position of the supreme leader from his father. The republic is led by a single party that functions on the so called juche, an ideology of national self-reliance. The Juche ideology is the cornerstone of party works and government operations. It is viewed by the official North Korean line as an embodiment of Kim Il-sung's wisdom (the grandfather...
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...reward, conformity to societal norms is key to the shaping the future of a nation, and ensuring the children learn this early one guarantees success in passing on the ideals of the state government. As Giroux points out, this ties perfectly in with surveillance of the people as “Surveillance feeds on the related notions of fear and delusion” (5). The threat of nonconformity to the state is heightened by the fact you will be caught and punished, so the notion of fear of the government fuels this cycle, one trapping the people at the foot of the state’s wishes. “Recruiting brutal young roughs for the police. Proposing debilitating and will-sapping techniques of conditioning… Before we know where we are we shall have the full apparatus of totalitarianism” (__), in addition to teaching the next generation the importance of...
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...Do you wish to be rule under totalitarianism ? Most people do not want to live in a country that is ruled by totalitarianism because it oppresses the human spirit. Human spirit or “Spirit of Man” can be defined as our mental part that includes our intellect, passions, fear and emotions. In the novel 1984, Winston believe that the spirit of man is strong enough to undermine a society and that the party of big brother will be defeated eventually. I agree that the “Spirit of man” is strong enough to undermine a society such as that created by The Party, and I believe Winston’s belief is applicable to the world we live in today. First of all, I total agree that “Spirit of man” is strong enough to undermine the society depicted in 1984 because...
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...Two Views of Totalitarianism George Orwell’s 1984 and James McTeigue’s “V for Vendetta” are very similar, but have some distinct differences in the plot. “V for Vendetta”, a futuristic version of a totalitarian government is taken over and destroyed by a masked man named V. Orwell’s 1984 is similar in this respect except that Winston, the protagonist of 1984, doesn’t seem to be as successful as V. Orwell was one to speak of how he sees the battle to be. Orwell has written several novels on the idea of revolutions against a superior government; one example would be 1984. He has inspired others to write there ideas on the thought of the future revolution from a dictatorship of extreme power. The film V for Vendetta is one example of an Orwell inspired story. In both Orwell's novel 1984 and the film V for Vendetta the protagonists Winston Smith and V live in similar difficult lives with extreme and controlling governments where they try to fight against there governments for the greater cause of freedom. There are many similar events and people in these two pieces of literature. In 1984, propaganda is broadcasted via telescreens. Similar to this, false news is broadcasted throughout the city of Oceania in 1984 by way of televisions. Both scenes have posters. 1984 has the posters with the phrase “BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU” similar to “STRENGTH THROUGH UNITY, UNITY THROUGH FAITH” in “V for Vendetta”.1984’s Winston and “V for Vendetta’s” Evey both experience the loss of their...
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...Hannah Arendt’s essay, On the Nature of Totalitarianism offers some very distinct definitions of ideologies and totalitarianism. Ideologies when used by a political leader drive their totalitarian movement. Elements such as rascism or anti-Semitism are real issues, however they become ideologies when a dictator pretends to frame a group of people, the Jews for example, for the fall of their nation. It is unfortunate and unfathomable to think the Nazi Party could rule over the nation on a foundation of lies. Enough people were brainwashed into believing that race ideology was “a living reality” (351). How could this many people accept these ideologies and have it result in the death of 6 million Jews and 5 million others? Once again, what was...
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...Totalitarianism is a state that is ruled by a single person that controls the state by dictatorship. It is achieved by controlling what the public think and do. This kind of government was used by the Soviet Union, Italy, and Germany. Also, they control the state’s economy which is a command economy rather than a demand economy. Command economy is a kind of economy that controls how much was made and where it goes by the government. Demand economy is what the people choose and how much is made, the law of supply and demand which is also known as the free market. The Great Depression contributed to totalitarianism and the rise of dictatorships such as Hitler, Mussolini, and Stalin. After the Great War, the world economy went down. This caused...
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...Why This Person is Superior George Orwell as a Novelist George Orweel is one of the leading novelists of modern age. His novels express a powerful sattire on the political and social hypocrisies. By thw quality of his writing, he has achieved international fame and recognition. In his evolution as a novelist he moved from simple narration to symbolic expression. But he has been criticised by many critics due to the lack of sincere characteristics of a novel in his novels. It has bveen proved that he has failed as a novelist. Tom Hopkinson opines, “Orwell’s reputaion as awriter rests largely on his novels, but his gifts are not those of a novelist; and, if the novel had not happened to be the prevailing literary form during the twenty years when he was writing, he would proably never have been attracted to it. Orwell had little imagination, little understanding of human relationshipl, little sympathy with individual human beings- though much with humanity in general.” O.D. Leavis also found that he had “wasted a lot of energy trying to be a novelist. I think I must have read three or four novels by him and the only impression those dreary books left on me was that nature didn’t intend him to be a novelist.” Edward M. Thomas also found that he did not possess the temperment of a novelist. Thus Orwell, who wished to produce more than thirty novels, had to admitin aletter, written to his friend, Julian Symons, “You are perfectly right about my own character constantly intruding...
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...the novel “1984” by representing what it is like to have your freedoms taken away. The main protagonist, Winston Smith, often finds himself struggling with himself and others to find the truth. In Plato’s “The Allegory of a Cave”, the character struggles to get his point across to his friends who refuse to accept the truth. Plato and George Orwell use rhetoric to explain the importance of freedom, whether the oppressor is someone else or yourself. George Orwell’s “1984” represents what life is like under a strict totalitarian government through the use of rhetoric. In his document, “Why I Write”, Orwell describes himself as “Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for...
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...Sussman 1 Adam Sussman HZT4U Ms. Efimov May 25, 2014 V for Vendetta Reflection Throughout the film V for Vendetta, V shows the audience his cleaver and insightful ways on how he plans to heal the damaged society. As V takes on the totalitarianism society run by the British Government, he displays to Kant’s theories that he is the opposite. Although his morals might be in the right place, he continuously uses others to meet the ends of his own means, which directly goes against Kant’s categorical imperative. Along with this, V’s revenge seeking mission goes against another maxim Kant put on his categorical imperative. This is the ‘universality’ maxim. If everyone were doing what V was doing the entire time, many more people would have been killed as well as they are would be no conflict in the first place. What the ‘party’ or the government of Great Britain has been doing the entire time would have never have occurred if they were all fighting the party like V was. V goes against every bit of Kant’s categorical imperative and justifies his own ends through other peoples will. V doesn’t force anyone to do anything in V for Vendetta but rather offers him or her a question of joining or opposing his ways. Sussman 2 As the film progresses, V just shows us how much he actually opposes the guidelines of Kant’s first maxim in his theory of the categorical imperative. The first maxim being universality, V shows the audience that he is the only one who can be doing this and no one else would...
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...Totalitarianism is a type of dictatorship its when the country doesn't have a limit with their authority and changes the public and private lives with what they think will help their country. Russia, Italy, Germany, and Japan were all totalitarian governments. Yes, I think the Third Reich was a totalitarian government because Hitler banished democracy and made it a dictatorship where he ruled every aspect of it. Adolf Hitler was popular because he was very skilled in politics, and was a good speaker to the public which won the Germans worship. The Nazi Party was built on militarism, nationalism, and racism telling the Germans that they were the superior race and blaming everyone else other than them for their defeat in the war. The only...
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...After World War One there were many repercussions from the war. The Soviet Union lost a war to Japan then later pulling out of World War One due to internal conflicts and workers strikes. This loss of power caused widespread anger and lost pride in an overly patriotic nation. Italy lost a generation of men to a war without benefits, they were ignored in discussions of diplomacy. Germany’s war repercussions along with their demilitarization and all loss sense of trade helped spark totalitarianism in Germany. All totalitarianism is born out of hate, fear, and charismatic leaders using these factors to advance personal agendas. The rise of totalitarianism in Russia came with the loss of nationalism after losing both the Russo-Japanese war and World War One. The Russian Government began their climb to a totalitarian state with the loss of the Russo-Japanese war. Japan clean...
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...In 1949, George Orwell wrote and published his final novel 1984 about a utopian society, Oceania, on the surface and a dystopian society when looked into further into through Winston Smith’s perspective. This character goes against the totalitarianism government ran by the Inner Party and Big Brother. Orwell gave a dramatic utopian and dystopian fiction book that is also political and social science fiction because Orwell often wrote about going against totalitarianism. Utopia is defined as ‘an imagined place or state of things in which everything is perfect.’ which is exactly how George Orwell portrayed Oceania to be for a majority of the citizens or Party members. Oceania’s government or Big Brother can do no wrong, especially in the eyes...
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