Alshammari 1

Sabika Alshammari
English 113B
Professor Lawson
May 11th, 2016
Project Text Final Draft
1225
Language as Social Control
Language is one of the main ways that people communicate with each other. Whether a
person is having a good day or a bad one, wishes to express love or hate, or wants to explain a
small or detailed point, people must use their words. Not all verbal expression is clear, however,
and words can be manipulated to control people into believing lies or supporting issues that are
not in their interests. Using language as social control is apparent in the fictional community of
Lois Lowrys book, The Giver, which tells the story of Jonas, a teenage boy who begins to
realize that his society is not as perfect as everyone else thinks it is. In Jonass society, the rulers,
known as the Elders, have changed the language so that people are not able to think for
themselves anymore and are forced to rely on what the rulers tell them. Unless people think that
Jonass community is the only one where language is manipulated, consider that politicians and
powerful organizations around the world manipulate language to control people. Language is
manipulated so that powerful people can control the masses and hide from them the truth about
what is happening in society.
The first way that powerful people use language as social control is by employing
euphemisms to make their ideas sound better than they are. Polemists, politicians, and tyrants
have long understood that language does not just express ideas; it also shapes ideas and
influences the way people think writes scholar Dan Stein in Needless Euphemisms, an article
which discusses how language has been used in the immigration debate. Feeding this quote into

Alshammari 2
The Giver works well since the ruling class in Jonass community prevents people from speaking
naturally, and forces them into using inaccurate language that does not express what they want.
In Jonass society, nobody uses the word death which has been replaced with the word
release since the Elders fear that death would upset the people so much that they would
uncontrollable. Release of newchildren was always sad, says the narrator in The Giver,
because they hadnt the chance to enjoy life within the community yet. And they hadnt done
anything wrong (7). These newchildren, a euphemism which substitutes for newborn, a word
that suggests life, are not released anywhere, but are dead. The Elders do not want the people to
think about death because people are scared of dying and death will cause people to become
fearful. This fear will be made worse since even the children are dying. To control the masses,
the Elders have created a language in which words are out of context and change how people
think about issues of life and death.
Powerful people also use language so that they can hide the truth about what is happening
in society. In the article, The Power of Language to Create Culture, authors Carmen Bowman,
Judah Ronch, and Galina Madjaroff discuss how language is used in a foster home, and write
that language has the power to impose hierarchy, assign blame, create shame, and by doing so,
reinforce existing power inequities (23). The general principle of how language can be used to
manipulate and cause inequities is evident in The Giver when Jonas thinks back on the first time
he lied. As the narrator says, Immediately he had been taken aside for a brief private lesson in
language precision. He was not starving, it was pointed out. He was hungry. No one in the
community was starving, had ever been starving, or would ever be starving. To say starving
was to speak a lie (70). Saying that he was starving is Jonass way of saying that he was very
hungry, but the reaction that the word causes shows that the powerful people have to manipulate

Alshammari 3
language so no one even thinks that starvation is even possible. If people in Jonass community
can say starvation, next they will be thinking about starvation, and this idea will upset them and
cause the order that the Elders created to fracture.
A real-life example of how language has been used for social control is bilingual
education. Kate Menkens article, Language Policy and Social Control, discusses how many
politicians have fought against instituting bilingual education into American schools even though
many students need this education since they do not speak English well. When language polices
are put into action, they are linked with power and with social justice in a range of ways.
Whenever schools set out to plan their response to language problems, they face matters of
language variety, race, culture, and class (6) writes Menken who believes that eliminating
bilingual education keeps minorities from reaching the top of their societies. This same situation
is seen in the novel when the Elders speak over the loudspeakers and deliver instructions to the
masses like: ATTENTION. THIS IS A REMINDER TO FEMALES UNDER NINE THAT
HAIR RIBBONS ARE TO BE NEATLY TIED AT ALL TIMES (23). The masses have no
control over what they can do and they cannot argue with what the Elders are saying since the
Elders give their orders over the loudspeakers. In real life, the masses can fight the power, but
standing up to the politicians and winning will not happen unless people are mobilized and loud
in their opposition. Unfortunately, most people would rather just be quiet and go on with life
since it is easier to go like this.
There are no advantages for the masses who are manipulated by powerful people who
want to socially control them unless being ignorant of the truth is an advantage. There is the old
saying, ignorance is bliss, but when peoples lives are made harder because of how language is
manipulated, and people are kept from improving their lives, this saying becomes worthless.

Alshammari 4
Manipulating language for social control leaves the masses unable to think critically about
important issues so that these issues never change and continue to cause them inconvenience and
trouble. A critical think must be on guard not only against language which intentionally
obscures thought by arousing emotions, but also against more subtle abuses of language: using
euphemisms, jargon, and obscure language to deceive and mislead (30) writes Robert Todd
Carroll and Kas Salazar in their book, Becoming a Critical Thinker. Thinking critically is hard
enough, but how is one to become a critical thinker when the language they are using is
manipulated so that it is inaccurate? Not everyone can be Jonas who is smart enough to see
through the lies, and for every Jonas that exists, there will be many more people who are like
Jonass parents or Jonass sister, Lily, or many other people in Jonass society.
Language has always been manipulated by powerful people to control the masses and
help hide the truth about society. Lowrys The Giver shows how language is manipulated by the
Elders to control the masses in the community so that they believe their society is perfect even
though there are serious problems. For the masses to ever be able to control themselves,
language needs to be clear so that their thinking is clear and they can provide solutions to
problems. However, powerful people will not give up their power without a fight, and they will
continue to manipulate language if doing so lets them maintain their positions over the masses.

Alshammari 5
Works Cited
Bowman Carmen, Ronch Judah, and Galina Madjaroff. The Power of Language to Create
Culture. Culture Change in Elder Care. Eds. Judah Ronch and Audrey S. Weiner.
Maryland: Health Professions Press. 2013. 16-25. Print.
Carroll, Robert Todd and Kas Salazar. Becoming a Critical Thinker. New York: Prentice Hall,
2000.
Lowry, Lois. The Giver. New York: Dell Laurel-Leaf, 1993.
Menken, Kate. English Learners Left Behind: Standardized Testing as Language Policy.
Bilingual Education and Bilingualism 65. Eds. Nancy H. Hornberger and Colin Baker.
Josue Gonzalez. 2007. 3-12. Print.
Stein, Dan. "Needless Euphemisms." Foreign Policy, 209 (2014): 10. Print.

Alshammari 6
Annotated bibliography
Language as Social Control
Bowman Carmen, Ronch Judah, and Galina Madjaroff. The Power of Language to Create
Culture. Culture Change in Elder Care. Eds. Judah Ronch and Audrey S. Weiner.
Maryland: Health Professions Press. 2013. 16-25. Print. Language is how people create
culture, and the words that people use create different perspectives. Culture is influenced
by words and all words have power and can be manipulated. This article is part of a
bigger book that I found on Google with the phrase language and social control. I
found the article first, then the book which was on the publishers website. I found
the authors online, looked at their sources, and looked at what other authors used this
work to see if it was a good source. I want to use this source to explain how language in
The Giver is used to hide reality since this source talks about how language can influence
perception and behavior.
Menken, Kate. English Learners Left Behind: Standardized Testing as Language Policy.
Bilingual Education and Bilingualism 65. Eds. Nancy H. Hornberger and Colin Baker.
Josue Gonzalez. 2007. 3-12. Print. Laws that govern what language people can speak
affect schools, governments, and families in communities around the world. Menken
writes about bilingualism from different perspectives, and addresses how different
political groups in the United States have tried to maintain power by pushing the United
States into becoming a monolingual country. This article is part of a larger e-book that
was in the CSUN Library. I found the e-book with the key words language and social
control which will be the title of my paper. To make sure that the article was credible, I looked
at who published the anthology and the sources that the Menken used. This article is about what
my paper will be about which is how language can be used to control people.

Alshammari 7
Stein, Dan. "Needless Euphemisms." Foreign Policy, 209 (2014): 10. Euphemisms are used in
political debates like immigration so that debaters never know what they really arguing
about. This is the main point of Steins article which discusses the role euphemisms have
in conversation. I found this article using Google, but I was able to find in in the Oviatt
Library also. To make sure that the article was credible, I looked at who published the work and
the sources that Stein used. This article will be used to show how powerful people keep the
masses from thinking about important issues.
Carroll, Robert Todd and Kas Salazar. Becoming a Critical Thinker. New York: Prentice
Hall, 2000. Becoming a critical thinker takes hard work, and is made harder when
language is imprecise and euphemisms are everyone. This argument is taken up by Carrol
and Salazar in their book. I found this book on Google Books and was able to find it in
the Oviatt Library also. To make sure that the book was credible, I looked at the
publisher, the arguments that were made, and the publisher. I will relate the books
arguments to Jonass community and our own society.