Newspeak as Coronaspeak 2020

Authors

  • Alwin F. Fill Dept. of English, Graz University, Austria

Keywords:

Coronaspeak; Metaphoric newspeak; Conspiracy theories; Home-office; Covidiots.

Abstract

A virus called Corona, in 2020, created a situation which had not existed since the 2nd World War. Everybody was in danger (this time of being infected), and people had to stay at home to avoid being ‘bombed’ (this time by a virus). This situation brought about the creation of several new words and the use of phrases which described the danger and the measures taken against it in a clear, but some of them also in a metaphorical way. News papers used the situation by making fun of the language used, but also by describing the linguistic phenomena which the situation originated. In one Austrian newspaper, a journalist (George Renne in the Kleine Zeitung) called the language used by the government “Newspeak” ”“ echoing George Orwell’s novel 1984. In this article, the most interesting word-creations will be discussed, as well as the various ways in which an unexpected situation (in the whole world) has an effect on the use of language.

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Author Biography

Alwin F. Fill, Dept. of English, Graz University, Austria

Especialista em linguística aplicada e professor de inglês na Universidade de Graz (Áustria), onde se aposentou em 2010, mas continua ativo em pesquisas, publicações e participação em eventos. Já em 1987 Fill falava em ecolinguística, como no livro Wörter zu Pflugscharen: Versuch einer Ökologie der Sprache, Viena: Böhlau. É autor do primeiro livro de introdução à ecolinguística (Ökolinguistik: Eine Einführung, Tübingen: Gunter Narr, 1993), além de diversos outros livros individuais e coletâneas. Uma coletânea marcante é The ecolinguistics reader (Londres: Continuum, 2001), organizada com Peter Mühlhäusler. Uma de suas últimas obras é The language impact: evolution, system, discourse, Londres: Equinox, 2010. Esse livro é um apanhado geral da história das ideias linguísticas, com a finalidade de demonstrar a tese de que o surgimento da língua na espécie humana foi semelhante ao impacto de um meteoro na terra. Em ECO-REBEL v. 1, n. 2, 2015, p. 132-136, podemos ver minirresenhas de mais dois livros de Fill. São eles: 1) Kinder- und Jugendlinguistik. Sprachspiel - Sprachwelt ”“ Sprachkritik. Viena: LIT Verlag, 2014 (Criança e linguística dos jovens: jogos linguísticos, mundo da linguagem, crítica da linguagem); 2) Linguistische Promenade: eine vergnügliche Wanderung durch die Sprachwissenschaft von Platon zu Chomsky. Viena: LIT Verlag, 2013, 3ed. (Passeio linguístico: uma caminhada divertida pela linguística de Platão e Chomsky).

References

YOUNG, John Wesley. Totalitarian Language. Orwell’s Newspeak and its Nazi and Communist Anticidents. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1991.

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Published

2020-12-19

How to Cite

Alwin F. Fill. (2020). Newspeak as Coronaspeak 2020. Ecolinguística: Revista Brasileira De Ecologia E Linguagem (ECO-REBEL), 6(4), 13–18. Retrieved from https://periodicos.unb.br/index.php/erbel/article/view/35671

Issue

Vol. 6 No. 4 (2020)

Section

Articles

License

Copyright (c) 2020 Ecolinguística: Revista brasileira de ecologia e linguagem (ECO-REBEL)

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