Set in the totalitarian society of Oceania, George Orwell’s 1984 illustrates how a government can exert complete control over its citizens through surveillance, manipulation, and more central to this essay, language. By employing a structuralist framework based on Ferdinand de Saussure’s research on semiotics and the system of language, this essay investigates the viability of Newspeak as a language. It does so by using the aspects of arbitrariness, value, difference, the collective, and mutability to discern to what extent Orwell’s Newspeak aligns with Saussure’s theory of how languages function. In addition, it looks at how these language changes can be observed using specific examples of the novel. The essay finds that the implementation of Newspeak is entirely reliant on other areas of the government’s totalitarian oppression in order to be feasibly implemented, as semiotic theory argues language is a product of the collective and, as such, cannot be constructed by a group of individuals. The essay thus concludes that Newspeak as a constructed language is not viable, as over time, the language will inevitably return to the hands of the collective consciousness, and once that happens, the language will begin to change according to the needs of the linguistic community.

Cette recherche porte sur la situation sociolinguistique en Algérie et sur les conflits linguistiques qu’elle a connus de 1962 à nos jours. L’objet de notre thèse se situe au croisement des facteurs historiques, politiques, socioculturels et des enjeux éducatifs. Il s’agit de développer une approche sociolinguistique afin d’analyser un conflit dialectique devenu permanent. Une première partie de ce travail met en évidence des aspects de ce conflit générés par l’opposition binaire entre le colonisateur et le colonisé. Nous proposons un aperçu historique remontant à 1830, en nous basant sur des témoignages historiques relatifs à la naissance de ce conflit identitaire, socioculturel et linguistique. Une deuxième partie analyse la situation sociolinguistique de 1962 à nos jours, une nouvelle période qui a vu apparaître un autre type de conflit. Il s’agit là d’un conflit tripartite, cette fois entre trois communautés linguistiques (arabophone, francophone, berbérophone) et leurs relations complexes et ambiguës. Après avoir présenté et étudié la situation dans le Maghreb en général et en Algérie en particulier, nous cherchons à comprendre les phénomènes et les pratiques sociolinguistiques que l’on peut observer actuellement auprès de la population algérienne. Une troisième partie comporte une étude empirique des comportements linguistiques et de la perception des différentes langues sur le terrain. Nous l’avons effectuée à l’aide d’un questionnaire destiné aux trois communautés linguistiques qui nous a permis d’évaluer le paysage sociolinguistique de la société algérienne dans des situations formelles et informelles et dans le rapport entre la sphère privée et la sphère publique. Au travers de cette recherche nous nous interrogeons sur la tension instaurée par ce conflit dialectique d’ordre sociolinguistique, dans un pays en proie à des divergences historiques, politiques et socioculturelles, mis face aux conséquences des politiques éducatives controversés de ces dernières décennies. Notre recherche soulève la question des enjeux de l’idéologisation et de la politisation de la question linguistique, mettant au jour ses effets sur l’image des langues en présence dans les perspectives des locuteurs algériens. / The research undertaken in this thesis is centred on the conflictive sociolinguistic situation in Algeria from 1962 until the present day. The main focus of this study can be found at the crossroads of historical factors with political and sociocultural ones as well as with questions pertaining to education. The aim is to develop a sociolinguistic approach of a permanent dialectic conflict. The first part of the study puts to the fore elements that characterise this conflict in its binary dimension between coloniser and colonised. We propose a historical vision of events that go back to 1830, basing our work on historical accounts pertinent to the origins of a sociocultural and linguistic conflict of identity. The second part analyses the sociolinguistic situation from 1962 until the present, a new period that has witnessed the arrival of new forms of conflict of a threefold type in accordance to three components related to the three linguistic communities (Arab-speaking, French-speaking and Berber-speaking) and to the complex and ambiguous relationships they entertain with one another. After the presentation of this question as regards the wider field of North Africa, we centre our study specifically on Algeria and seek to understand the sociolinguistic phenomena and practices developed by Algerians. A third part is devoted to an empirical field study based on a questionnaire aimed at the three linguistic communities. This work has enabled us to evaluate the sociolinguistic landscape of Algerian society in formal and informal situations, and in the relationship between private and public space. This study questions the tensions arising from a sociolinguistic situation that evolved from historical, political, socio-cultural an educational reasons. It brings to light questions pertaining to a certain ideological and political use of the linguistic aspects of the country, highlighting the effects on the image of the languages concerned as regards the perspectives of Algerian speakers.

La complexité de la configuration linguistique des plusieurs pays africains mérite un regardneuf sur les phénomènes des langues en contact et de plurilinguisme dans la mesure oùelles instaurent de nouvelles dynamiques qu’il convient de prendre en compte, de décrire etd’étudier. En effet, notre recherche axée sur la sociolinguistique et la didactique des languestente de décrire et d’expliquer un dynamisme linguistique révélateur d’une dynamiqueidentitaire en Angola. Les processus communicatifs que cette étude envisage de mettre enévidence se caractérisent par un éventail de transgressions qu’on tentera d’aborder moinscomme des formes déviantes, des écarts à une norme donnée, que comme une (ré)-appropriation des langues en contact dans le champ communicationnel et commel’affirmation d’une identité plurielle imprimée par les représentations des langues et despositionnements épilinguistiques des locuteurs angolais. L’objectif ici est de déceler lesattitudes des locuteurs, leur sens de créativité linguistique et finalement décrire le françaispratiqué en Angola, qui suite aux phénomènes de migrations forcées par les guerres civileset des répressions coloniales, abrite un grand nombre de locuteurs francophones etplurilingues en son sein. / The complexity of the language configuration of several African countries deserves a freshlook at the phenomena of language contact and multilingualism because they introduce newdynamics suitable to be taken into account, to describe and study. Indeed, our researchfocuses on sociolinguistics and language teaching and it attempts to describe and explain alinguistic dynamism revealing a new form of identity in Angola. Communicative process thatthis study intends to highlight is characterized by a range of transgressions that we shallattempt to broach not really as distorted forms or disparity of a given standard language. Weview them as a (re) -appropriation of languages in contact into the communicative field andas an affirmation of a plural identity revealed by the representations of languages andsubconscious positions of Angolan speakers. The objective here is to identify the attitudes ofthe speakers, their sense of linguistic creativity and finally describe the variety of Frenchlanguage practiced in Angola, country with a large number of French speakers andmultilingual therein due to the unprecedented migrations forced by civil wars and colonialrepressions. / A complexidade da configuração linguística de vários países da África merece um novo olharsobre os fenômenos de contato de línguas e do plurilinguismo, na medida em queintroduzem novas dinâmicas a serem levadas em conta para descrever e estudar. De fato,nossa pesquisa que gira em torno da sociolinguística e didática de línguas, tenta descrever eexplicar um dinamismo linguístico que revela as dinâmicas identitárias em Angola. Oprocesso comunicativo que este estudo pretende destacar, apresentam uma gama detransgressões que tentamos de abordar não como formas distorcidas ou desvios àdeterminada norma, mas como (re) -apropriação das línguas em contato na esferacomunicativa e como afirmação de uma identidade plural impressa pelas representações delínguas e posições epilinguísticas dos locutores angolanos. Visamos aqui, identificar asatitudes dos falantes, seu senso de criatividade linguística e finalmente descrever o francêspraticado em Angola, que por força das migrações sem precedentes impostas pelas guerrascivis e repressões coloniais, abarca um grande número de falantes de francês e plurilinguesno seu seio.

[pt] O presente trabalho analisa a linguagem política republicana através de textos produzidos por Hermes da Fonseca, Rui Barbosa e seus correligionários no contexto da Campanha Civilista. Ao contrário da historiografia mais tradicional, buscaremos mostrar como os dois candidatos tinham ideias mais convergentes do que divergentes a respeito da república brasileira, apesar de suas formações profissionais distintas. Tal proximidade entre as ideias se deve ao fato de ambos participarem de uma mesma comunidade linguística (no sentido empregado por Pocock), onde tanto a política republicana como a nação vinham apresentadas de maneira bastante semelhantes. Foram as distintas inserções e as alianças que cada um estabeleceu com os grupos políticos regionais, então em embate, que continuaram sendo as principais responsáveis pela demarcação das suas diferenças durante a disputa presidencial. / [en] In this dissertation I analyze the republican political language through the texts produced by Hermes da Fonseca, Rui Barbosa, and their followers during the so-called Campanha Civilista. Unlike the traditional historiography, I will try to demonstrate that the ideas of both candidates about the Brazilian Republic were more convergent than divergent, despite their different professional backgrounds. Such similarity is due to the fact that both shared a same linguistic community (in the sense Pocock understands it) wherethe concept of republican politics and that one of nation appear in a very similar way. Their distinctalliances ans insertions among the regional political groups remained being responsible for the main differences they presented during this presidential campaign.