An indispensable guide through the work of the world's most influential living intellectual.

Language, this book argues, is political from top to bottom, whether considered at the level of an individual speaker's choice of language or style of discourse with others (where interpersonal politics are performed), or at the level of political rhetoric, or indeed all the way up to the formation of national languages. By bringing together this set of topics and highlighting how they are interrelated, the book will function well as a textbook on any applied or sociolinguistic course in which some or all of these various aspects of the politics of language are covered.

Multilingualism is an ever-present feature in political contexts around the world, including multilingual states and international organizations. Increasingly, consequential political decisions are negotiated between politicians who do not share a common native language. Nils Ringe uses the European Union to investigate how politicians’ reliance on shared foreign languages and translation services affects politics and policy-making. Ringe's research illustrates how multilingualism is an inherent and consequential feature of EU politics—that it depoliticizes policy-making by reducing its political nature and potential for conflict. An atmosphere with both foreign language use and a reliance on translation leads to communication that is simple, utilitarian, neutralized, and involves commonly shared phrases and expressions. Policymakers tend to disregard politically charged language and they are constrained in their ability to use vague or ambiguous language to gloss over disagreements by the need for consistency across languages.

"A [book] rich in detail and analysis, which anyone wanting to understand the language debate in Puerto Rico will find essential."--Arlene Davila, Syracuse University This is the first book in English to analyze the controversial language policies passed by the Puerto Rican government in the 1990s. It is also the first to explore the connections between language and cultural identity and politics on the Caribbean island. Shortly after the U.S. invasion of Puerto Rico in 1898, both English and Spanish became official languages of the territory. In 1991, the Puerto Rican government abolished bilingualism, claiming that "Spanish only" was necessary to protect the culture from North American influences. A few years later bilingualism was restored and English was promoted in public schools, with supporters asserting that the dual languages symbolized the island’s commitment to live in harmony with the United States. While the islanders’ sense of ethnic pride was growing, economic dependency enticed them to maintain close ties to the United States. This book shows that officials in both San Juan and Washington, along with English-first groups, used the language laws as weapons in the battle over U.S.-Puerto Rican relations and the volatile debate over statehood. It will be of interest to linguists, political scientists, students of contemporary cultural politics, and political activists in discussions of nationalism in multilingual communities.

George Orwell set out ‘to make political writing into an art’, and to a wide extent this aim shaped the future of English literature – his descriptions of authoritarian regimes helped to form a new vocabulary that is fundamental to understanding totalitarianism. While 1984 and Animal Farm are amongst the most popular classic novels in the English language, this new series of Orwell’s essays seeks to bring a wider selection of his writing on politics and literature to a new readership. In Politics and the English Language, the second in the Orwell’s Essays series, Orwell takes aim at the language used in politics, which, he says, ‘is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind’. In an age where the language used in politics is constantly under the microscope, Orwell’s Politics and the English Language is just as relevant today, and gives the reader a vital understanding of the tactics at play. 'A writer who can – and must – be rediscovered with every age.' — Irish Times

Now available in its 3rd edition, with new commentary on political psychology and communication in the Trump era, Kling's book could not be any more timely, as Americans--whether as media pundits or conversing at a party--talk past one another with even greater volume, heat, and disinterest in contrary opinions.The Three Languages of Politics it is a book about how we communicate issues and our ideologies, and how language intended to persuade instead divides.

This study is the second of two I have done concerning how language is used to persuade others to believe things and to do things. The first, published by Aca demic Press, was The Language of Television Advertising, and was concerned with how advertisers use language in their efforts to sell products and services and how consumers could be expected to understand it. In this study, the focus is on how politicians use language to win elections and get others to accept their policies and programs and on how journalists report the suasive efforts of politicans. I combine an interest in the language of political reporting with an interest in the language of politics for a number of reasons. First, much of the suasive rhetoric of politicians is filtered through the minds of political journalists before it reaches the citizenry, and we can be reasonably sure that this rhetoric does not come out the way it went in. Second, the press plays a significant role in deter mining the nation's political agenda through its choices of what issues will be presented to the public, how these issues will be presented, and which voices will be heard speaking out on these issues. Third, political reporting can be suasive in effect, if not in intent, and it will be useful, I think, to understand how this is so.