The life of a party member involves being constantly subjected to government propaganda by the medium of the telescreen. This is a device similar to a television placed in the home and workplace of Party members, unlike a television it cannot be turned off and it transmits as well as receives. Winston works at the Ministry of

I have not really scratched the surface of concepts of information manipulation that Orwell highlights in Nineteen Eighty- Four, Newspeak for instance. A whole book could be written on this language and probably has been. After reading Orwell and Chomsky a great deal of correlation is evident between their ideas. Orwell says: The really frightening thing about totalitarianism is not that it commits 'atrocities' but that it attacks the concept of objective truth; it claims to control the past as well as the future (1944) Although we live in a so-called democracy today the practice of history rewriting still seems to be prevalent. Chomsky says: the picture of the world that's presented to the public has only the remotest relation to reality. The truth of the matter is buried under edifice after edifice of lies upon lies... It's not like a totalitarian state, where it's done by force. These achievements are under conditions of freedom (1991). Although we do live in a free society (try arguing that we don't with someone who's lived under an oppressive regime), we live under what Chomsky calls a self-imposed totalitarianism (1991) with our televisions as our telescreens. As our daily newspapers switch political allegiances, who is to say that they are not employing modern day Winston Smiths to change accounts of the past. Why should the Sun hark on about the good old days under the Tory government when they want Blair to win the next election?

I believe evidence of Orwell's own belief in the power of persuasive propaganda is expressed through the thoughts of Winston. Although Winston is a rebellious thinker who initially uses the two minute hate to vent his detestation of Insoc and it's subsidiary organisations, he finds his feelings switching to a hatred of the image of Goldstein. He then voluntarily switches his hatred to the image of the girl behind him.

Noam Chomsky develops these ideas and applies them to the Vietnam and Gulf wars. He describes a study that was done at the University of Massachusetts on attitudes towards the Gulf war. This study was designed to gauge the beliefs and attitudes of television watchers. One of the questions asked in that study was, How (sic) many Vietnamese casualties would you estimate that there were during the Vietnam war? The average response on the part of Americans today is about 100,000. The official figure is about two million. The actual figure is probably three to four million. (Chomsky 1991). This example highlights an almost eerie foresight into the future from Orwell. Are the telescreens that pump out propaganda and manipulated facts and figures to the population of Oceania really that different in principle to the televisions that are dotted around our houses now? It seems that the information broadcast on television is believed by its viewers.

Truth, one of four government ministries. The Ministry of Love is concerned with law and order, The Ministry of peace concerns itself with war, The Ministry of Plenty which deals with economic affairs and The Ministry of Truth which is responsible for the production of news, education, entertainment and fine arts.

Some common words found in the essay are:
University Massachusetts, Orwell Chomsky, Goldstein Party, Hitler Nazis, Ministry Plenty, Mc Carthyists, Ministry Truth, Winston Smith, Creel Commission, Chomsky1991 Chomsky, ministry truth, world war, raids happened, nineteen eighty-four, government propaganda, world war ii, vietnam war, nineteen eighty-, chomsky 1991, hatred image, history books,
Approximate Word count = 2251
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page double spaced)