William Lutz. New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1989.
Reviewed by Paul A. Cesarini, Bowling Green State University
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In the brave new worlds of cross-disciplinary writing and post-secondary English pedagogy, there has been a strong emphasis placed language itself as a tool for learning. Teaching ideologies ranging from logical positivism to social constructionism a nd discourse communities have all b een hashed and rehashed, but very little emphasis has been placed on ethical considerations within the disciplines. This is where WiIliam Lutz, presenter of the annual Doublespeak award and editor of The Doublespeak Review, boldly steps in with his nationally-recognized book, Doublespeak.
Doublespeak is mainly geared toward English teachers and upper-classmen; freshmen English students may have some difficulty understanding the underlying theories of critical think ing involved. Doublespeak was required reading back in my undergraduate rhetorical theory class; I have used it more than once for classes I have taught, and I'm told it is widely used in other forums as well.
The term "doublespeak" was coined as an amalgam of two Orwellian expressions, doublethink and newspeak. In 1984, doublethink was the "mental process that allows you to hold two opposing views in your mind at the same time and believe in b oth of them.&quo t; The now-classic example of this is "War is Peace." Lutz mentions how newspeak was the official state language in 1984, a language that was specifically designed to make state-approved "correct" thoughts possible, while simultaneously making any contrary views not merely unlikely but unthinkable. Doublespeak, then, is the language of deceit. Its sole purpose is to make the unreasonable seems reasonable, the blamed seem blameless, the powerless seem empowered. T hough the sole point of language is to communicate and clarify, doublespeak miscommunicates and obfuscates.
Lutz begins with a short preface where he equates language as being a tool like any other tool a drill, a hammer, a printer. He mentions h ow tools are created to achieve specific purposes, but when these tools literally fall into the wrongs hands, their purposes are altered. He uses the analogy that language can be used to both write the constitution and write plans for a winnable nuc lear war. His key point is being that when language is used for purposes other than what it was originally designed for to communicate it is not an accident or a slip-up; in most cases it is purely deliberate.
The first chapter acts more as a &q uot;debriefing" on what to expect from the rest of the book and how to recognize it. He breaks doublespeak down into four major categories: the euphemism, jargon, gobbledygook, and inflated language, then gives concise descriptions and example s of each.
He describes euphemisms as being "...an inoffensive word or phrase used to avoid a harsh, unpleasant, or distasteful reality." He makes an immediate distinction between euphemisms that are not doublespeak and those that are. Saying someone has "passed away", for example, is not doublespeak because it is said out of concern for someone's feelings and out of respect for adhering to socially-constructed taboos. Plus, these types of euphemisms are common knowledge : everyone knows that "passed away" means "died."
But when a euphemism is used to deceive, it becomes doublespeak. Lutz cites an example of how the State Department announced it was replacing the term "killing" in its future reports with the phrase "unlawful or arbitrary deprivation of life" in order to avoid or minimize discussion on CIA-sponsored terrorist groups down in Central America.
Much like the euphemism, jargon the specialized "tra de" language within a professional group also has its acceptable and unacceptable forms. If the jargon stays within the specific professional group, for instance if doctors discuss medical terminology among themselves, it isn't doublespeak beca use they all understand the terms. However, if jargon is used outside of that group it becomes doublespeak because the intended audience won't be familiar with these terms. He mentions how jargon is deceptively used to "...make the simp le appear complex, the ordinary profound, the obvious insightful." (4) Again, by throwing good, clear examples at the reader, Lutz illustrates his point. The act of smelling something becomes "organoleptic analysis", while if your h ouse is broken into it or destroyed it suffers an "involuntary conversion."
Lutz mentions that gobbledygook, also known as bureaucratese, is unacceptable in any shape or form. Gobbledygook is probably the easiest type of doublespeak to p erpetrate on an unsuspecting audience, because all that's needed is to endlessly pile on words and overwhelm whomever is listening. This way the person in question can give the appearance (a key word!) of authority and creditability of a subject and intimidate his or her audience into submission. For years, Alan Greenspan a former Nixon official and current Chair of the Federal reserve has been doing just that. Lutz gives Greenspan an enormous pie-to-the-face by quoting a statement from him during a Senate committee hearing. In reference to a question, Greenspan states, "It is a tricky problem to find a particular calibration in timing that would be appropriate to stem the acceleration in risk premiums created by falling income w ithout prematurely aborting the decline in inflation-generated risk premium." Any more questions for Mr. Greenspan?
The fourth type of doublespeak, inflated language, is perhaps the most common and is the opposite of the euphemism. Inflated language is designed to "...make the ordinary seem extraordinary; to make everyday things seem impressive." In relatively harmless settings, this is where garbage men might refer to themselves as "sanitation engineers", or where used cars are called "previously distinguished vehicles." Lutz then points out the more nefarious uses of inflated language, such as when a fire in a nuclear power plant was described as a "rapid oxidation."
In an effort to s ound "academic" (whatever that means) many students resort to using Lutz's four main kinds of doublespeak particularly gobbledygook and inflated language in their papers. Whether or not this comes from secondary school conditioning to &q uot;write for college", or from a genuine uncertainty in knowing what English teachers expect, is uncertain. Perhaps students think of inflated language as an easy way out toward meeting the required page length of a given assignment you can on ly tweek the margins so much, right? Considering inflated language does exactly that inflate it almost seems like a no-brainer for students to endlessly string together prepositional phrases, indulge in pretentious terminology and noun-stacking, a nd generally achieve maximum density with a minimum of content.
However, unlike Lutz's definition of doublespeak, the language of deceit, I'm not certain students resort to it with that same intent. They don't intentionally write to mislead, misd irect, and deceive; they usually do it because they don't know any better they probably think they are writing well. This is probably the main point of Lutz's book: to be aware of the implications of what is being said and how it is being said, in o ther peoples' writing and our own. For both students and teachers, this lesson is invaluable.
After whetting our appetites, Lutz hits us from all sides with chapters II through VIII. Each one deals with doublespeak within different disciplines, but he arranges them in an extremely interesting way: from relatively harmless to positively malicious. I hadn't even realized this the first time I read the book, but I'm certain he didn't do this by accident. Chapters II-V deal with the double speak of everyday living, of advertising, business, and around the world, while chapters VI-VIII focus on the Pentagon, government, and the doublespeak of nuclear war. (keep in mind that this was written over a year before the dissolution of the Sov iet Union.)
Once again Lutz lobs volley after volley of examples to both hammer away at his points and blast away our collective naiveté. In The Doublespeak of Everyday Living, he points out how airlines give instructions for a &quo t;water landing" (not a crash), how the food industry sells "previously chilled" poultry (not frozen), and how gas companies now send "energy documents" (not bills.) In The Doublespeak of Advertising: With These Words I C an Sell You Anything, Lutz blasts those who would pawn "virgin vinyl", "genuine imitation leather", and "real counterfeit diamonds" on us as if they were priceless and prized.
He then moves on to "weasel wo rds", that is, words that appear to communicate more about a product but in fact add no content at all. Words like "help", "aids", "relieves", and "assists" are all weasel words because they don't actually say anything. How many cold remedy commercials have there been that claim to "help relieve symptoms" or "aid in fighting germs"? Like all doublespeak, these words cloud rather than clarify.
The next several chapters continue in much the same way: definition, example, definition, example, etc. While the examples are Lutz's strongest point, I'll admit that the reading becomes somewhat predictable after awhile. However, the final chapters more than make-up for that. Lut z skewers Reagan for his coining of the phrases "disinformation", and "misspoke." He goes on to lay waste to Alexander Haig (for his statement that "...a continued weapons buildup is absolutely essential to our hopes for mean ingful arms reduction."), George Bush, Bob Dole, Frank Carlucci, Oliver North, James Baker, Senator Lawton Chiles, James Watt, Dewey Claridge, William Westmoreland, Arlon Aldrige, Marlon Fitzwater, Chief Justice William Renhquist, and basically the entire Republican regime of the 1980's.
Lutz leans heavily on the military for using terms like "human remains pouches" for body bags, "preemptive counterattacks" for invasions, "collateral damage" for civilian ca sualties, "energetic dissassemblies" for explosions, and "radiation enhancement devices" for nuclear weapons.
Nearly all of these examples invoke strong responses (usually laughter or revulsion) in the classroom, which I believ e helps students retain the knowledge better. When I used Doublespeak while teaching a technical communications course a few ago, I would often hear some of my students joking and telling their friends about "preemptive counterattacks&quo t; in the hallways.
It can be argued that Lutz's viewpoints are somewhat left of center and that his book is simply a politically-biased attack on conservatives within our government. If this is the case, then should we be using a book favorin g a particular political viewpoint to teach students? Probably not. However, I don't think Lutz had ulterior motives here, nor do I think it is politically biased, for one simple reason: This book was published in 1989 which means it was probabl y originally written in 1987 or 1988. During that time Michael Douglas declared "greed was good" in Wall Street, our government was dominated by Republicans, and the Democrats were in full retreat. Lutz's examples, more than anythi ng else, are merely a reflection of the 1980's zeitgeist; he picks on more conservatives because there were more of them to pick on.
If anything, this is all the more reason to use the book in class. Since most underclassmen were probably child ren in the 1980's, Doublespeak gives them more insight into the times they grew up in. This may seem trivial, but remember: the '80's are now considered "classic". Most of the bad, 1980's TV shows like The Love Boat and Fantasy Isla nd are in syndication right now; many bars and clubs feature "Retro '80's Nights", and not a week goes by without seeing an advertisement on TV for '80's compilation albums. Doublespeak has the potential to teach English and history at the same time.
Regardless of any perceived bias in his writing, William Lutz has created an astounding book that has equal relevance for teachers and students. Since it covers such a broad range of fields such as advertising, politics, and co rproate America, it is an ideal tool for classes involving cross-disciplinary writing. It exposes those who would attempt to pull the wool over our eyes, mislead us, and just plain lie, while indirectly showing us what to watch out for in our own wri ting. His examples range from the humorous to the sardonic; his tone from light (or is it "lite"? He devotes several pages to that!) to cynical. With Bush saying the economy was in a state of "negative growth" in 1992, Dole sta ting that tobacco "isn't necessarily addictive", and Clinton calling the FBI file scandal a "bureaucratic snafu", I am certain Lutz will have more than enough material for Doublespeak 2: Son of Doublespeak, or something simi lar. I'll be in line to get the first copy, and you can bet it will be on my next syllabus.
pcesari@cyberdude.com/
Last Updated: 97-03-04 / Disclaimer