Summer Assignment Honors

Honors Summer Assignment: 1984 Dialectical Journal, Summer 2020

§ First, acquire and read 1984 by ! Then you will complete a two-part dialectical journal, below. Objectives of the two-part dialectical journal:

• Understand and recognize allusion as a literary and rhetorical device

• Apply research discovery to text

• Analyze allusions for greater depth of understanding in regard to the context, purpose, and intended audience of a text

• Connect cultural context of a text with the author’s language

• Articulate how nuances in language (in regard to diction, syntax, figurative language, etc.) help to reveal the author’s intentions

• Articulate the impact of the manipulation of language Due Date/Submission Instructions: This assignment will be due the first day of class. Make sure it is completed digitally for turnitin.com submission. You will also need to access it in class for discussion, so plan to print it or save to Google Docs to access from your phone. Journal Part 1: Allusions

• Choose TWO of the topics (allusions) listed in the chart below to conduct research about, and summarize your findings IN YOUR OWN WORDS (DO NOT cut and paste!) o You must use at least two academically sound resources and you must provide a works referenced--add a page to the end of this assignment.

• Then, via the columns in the chart below, you will:

1. Draw connections between the topics researched and the allusions made in the text by Orwell (Consider: Where is the allusion used? What is his purpose in using this allusion? Who might his intended audience be and how does this allusion help point out something important to them?) Summer Assignment Honors

2. Provide cited textual support in order to analyze the implications of the language Orwell uses to discuss the allusion (Consider: What is special about the use of language in the accompanying quote? How does this specific use of language reveal additional information about the culture and context of the text?)

Allusion: A reference, explicit or indirect, to a well-known person, place, or event, etc. Most allusions serve to illustrate or enhance the subject, but some are used in order to undercut it ironically through the discrepancy between the subject and the allusion (A Glossary of Literary Terms, Abrams).

Summer Assignment Honors

An example is completed for you, so that you understand the expectation. Topic choices Findings (100-200 words) Connection to allusion in text, with analysis of Cited textual support with authorial purpose and intended audience analysis of how language reveals culture/context Ex. Shakespeare William Shakespeare was born on April One allusion to this topic can be found in Part I, “Winston woke up with 26, 1564, in Stratford-upon-Avon, Chapter 3. Winston has just had a dream in the word “Shakespeare” England, and died in 1616. He is the which he saw various images, including his on his lips” (Orwell 29). world’s most popular playwright. His mother and a naked woman, and thinks This description of how popularity was as a result of several of/possibly utters "Shakespeare" the moment Shakespeare is thought of things: he awakes. The allusion to Shakespeare is and mentioned in the • His plays have action deliberate on Orwell’s part. Shakespeare wrote world of Big Brother • His characters are believable about the complexities of emotion that exist highlights the taboo and • His language is thrilling to hear or within the human predicament, the exact forgotten nature of such read opposite of the world of Big Brother, where people and things (i.e. • He has a deep humanity and personal freedoms and emotions have been revered authors and understood people well reduced to the smallest of quotients, and literature). The word is • He had a great tolerance, history has been discarded and rewritten. The “on his lips”, which sympathy, and love for all people, allusion is therefore ironic because the world of connotes the sense that good or evil. Big Brother has removed all such human he dares not to say it Shakespeare wrote both comedies and expressions (and respect for literature and aloud due to the fact that tragedies. From 1594 onward, he was an history). With this allusion, Orwell highlights history has been important member of the Lord the dysfunction in this dystopia, and discarded, and also that Chamberlain’s Men company of communicates to his post-WWII audience the this thought is fleeting theatrical players. Written records give dangers totalitarian and communistic and impermanent, due to little indication of the way in which governments pose to our emotional lives and the effects Summer Assignment Honors

Shakespeare’s professional life molded the preservation of our history. has had on the minds of his artistry. Over the course of 20 years, Oceanian citizens. Shakespeare wrote plays that capture the complete range of human emotion and conflict. 1. Winston Churchill 2. Adam Smith 3. Joseph Stalin 4. Leon Trotsky 5. WWII Propaganda 6. Hitler Youth 7. Gestapo/NKGB 8. Socialism 9. Militarism 10. Victory Branding

Journal Part 2: Language Manipulation

• Think about the ways in which language is changed and manipulated in 1984, and for what purpose---, Party names of ministries, the controlling of personal written and spoken language of the citizens, various forms of propaganda (Victory branding, & Hate Week, Party slogans and general untruths disseminated to the public), the revision of history books, etc. Summer Assignment Honors

• Then, using the chart below to organize your thoughts, you will:

1. Select and cite TWO quotes from the novel that speak to these issues 2. Analyze how and why language is being manipulated for a specific purpose in the world of Oceania, and the point Orwell was trying to get across with his treatment of this topic

An example is completed for you, so that you understand the expectation. Quote Analysis Ex. “The whole literature of the past will have been destroyed. This quote references the fact that the Party is not only changing the Chaucer, Shakespeare, Milton, Byron…” (Orwell 47). language of Oceania to Newspeak, but is also getting rid of all literature in Oldspeak. Because language is a reflection of thought, the Party knows it is dangerous to allow the citizens exposure to any concepts that do not align with their doctrine, as they can sow the seeds of confusion, discomfort, and eventually rebellion; thus, all works by renowned authors must be destroyed. The reference to Shakespeare is particularly ironic because Shakespeare created language when he needed words or phrases to fit his verse and his thinking, while Newspeak does quite the opposite. With this, Orwell clearly demonstrates the danger in allowing a government to hold power over the language, and therefore the thought, of its citizens, as it could eventually result in a world where people don’t know of Shakespeare, and by extension, the concepts of freedom, love, personal choice, etc. 1. 2.