Language of Authoritarianism in America

Vaclav Havel starts off a 1979 essay on eastern European society with this image: “The manager of a fruit and vegetable shop places in his window, among the onions and carrots, the slogan: 'Workers of the World, Unite!' Why does he do it? What is he trying to communicate to the world? Is he genuinely enthusiastic about the idea of unity among the workers of the world?... Has he really given more than a moment's thought to how such a unification might occur and what it would mean?”

Havel answers no, this grocer has no need to think about what it means because no one else does. In eastern Europe everyone has been raised on this stuff and they know by now that when one quotes Marx, all they are really saying is 'I am a normal person who does not want to attract attention to himself' This is called normative or performative use of language, where it only matters that it is said, not what is said. In a society imbued with propaganda it is very easy to spot the people who merely reproduce the message because it is the easiest thing to do, there is no risk or challenge. Furthermore these people are attuned to what language is propaganda and what isn't and so keep their sanity in a world split between unquestionable meaning and their own private lives.

Under the soviet system most people were neither dissidents or activists; they simply didn't care about politics. Those who did resist were often seen as dangerous to the state and dealt with. Interestingly, those who were activists and truly believed in the communist program were also disruptive to the state. Imagine your local grocer really believing the workers of the world should unite, and haranguing you about it everyday, and also doing everything in his power to unite and organize workers. Taken literally, most communist ideology was as threatening to the state if it was followed as if it was resisted. Just think of how many labor unions were smashed and strikes broken up by communist states. So in a society where no one used the constantive meaning (opposite of performative), those who did threatened the stability of the rest.

In the United States we also have a national performative language. When we talk about things like freedom, equality, democracy, free speech etc., we understand the societal (performative) meanings of these words without fully considering their constantive meanings. Lets take the right to self expression for example. I found a news report recently http://www.wpxi.com/education/8508170/detail.html about a ten year old girl who is protesting her right wear a mini-skirt to school because she needs the freedom to express her individual identity. This girl clearly uses the same argument that many others have used to win their rights of expression, but in a way that none of them intended. But because she is repeating accepted phrases that have a resonance in our society (as opposed to not wanting to wear clothes or wanting to look cute for other 4^th graders), she causes a minor disturbance.

This girl is an activist, someone who takes our uncontested American language seriously and therefore threatens what we call normal society just by upholding the values our normal society is supposedly based on. Some (probably more liberal observers) may find her argument noteworthy because it is within their own language of authority, after all, why can't 4^th graders express themselves? Others, (possibly more conservative) see this as a sign of the absurdities of the left, that things have gone too far, because they may be more likely to pick up the stand out phrases

Unlike in the Soviet Union and the communist bloc countries, we have two sources of authoritarian language, and neither is as strong or unified as the Soviets was. But because neither is as strong, they are both more believable to their respective followers. We don't know when we're being propagandized to!

I make note of an earlier 'vine post http://sheep.newsvine.com/_news/2006/04/07/159903-how-to-distinguish-between-news-and-propaganda, about republican use of key terms used repeatedly to solidify identity and allegience more than getting a point accross. The right sees a 'liberal media filter' and the left sees a 'conservative propaganda' but both sides have a much harder time seeing their own linguistic framework. (I'm heartened that most liberals don't like Michael Moore)

So what am I saying? I am not saying we are spiraling down towards some horrific low of 1984 style control through language. Nor am I saying that present phenomenon are fundamentally or significantly different than the past; proclaiming such things is, I think, the most frequently drawn false conclusion in popular social commentary. However, 'viners and the public at large would benefit for sharpening their reading eye to the use of language as an identifier and social signifier, and most importantly in our own speech, myself included, being aware of the sub-conscious use of language to strengthen our social status quo rather than express our ideas.