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

A topsy-turvy continent adrift among the gales of newspeak, under the gaze of a million grey bureaucrats passing for big brothers.

From Project Gutenberg

Related Words

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